Language impairment in Parkinson’s disease (PD) has been investigated at different levels of linguistic skills. Only a few studies dealt with pragmatic abilities in PD, and these suggest an impairment of pragmatic skills, which might affect quality of life. However, previous studies enrolled patients with heterogeneous symptom severity. The goal of this study is twofold: first, to investigate whether pragmatic skills are compromised at the early stage of PD; second, to explore whether an early pragmatic impairment is explained by a decay of a specific cognitive function. We assessed pragmatic abilities (discourse production, comprehension of narratives, humour, and figurative language), and a cluster of cognitive functions (memory, verbal fluency, inhibition, shifting, and ToM) in a sample of early PD patients and a group of age-matched healthy controls. Early PD patients showed impaired general pragmatic skills (the ability to perform different pragmatic tasks in language production and comprehension), as well as a deficit in the production and comprehension individual scores. Our results suggest that good general cognitive skills (a good overall cognitive level) and high education support patients’ pragmatic competence. Inhibitory processes have been found to predict patients’ ability to understand figurative language, such as metaphors, and this might be related to frontal lobe dysfunctions.

帕金森氏病（PD）的语言障碍已在不同语言水平上进行了调查。仅有少数研究涉及PD的实用能力，这些研究提示实用技能受损，这可能会影响生活质量。但是，先前的研究招募了症状严重程度不同的患者。这项研究的目的是双重的：首先，研究在PD早期阶段是否损害了实用技能；其次，探讨早期的实用性障碍是否可以通过特定认知功能的下降来解释。我们评估了语用能力（话语产生，对叙事，幽默和比喻语言的理解）以及一系列认知功能（记忆，口语流利，抑制，转移，和ToM）中的早期PD患者和一组与年龄匹配的健康对照者。早期的PD患者表现出一般的语用能力受损（在语言表达和理解能力上执行不同的语用任务的能力），以及在表达和理解能力方面的得分不足。我们的研究结果表明，良好的一般认知能力（良好的整体认知水平）和较高的教育水平可以支持患者的语用能力。已经发现抑制过程可以预测患者理解比喻等比喻语言的能力，这可能与额叶功能障碍有关。以及个人理解力和生产能力的不足。我们的研究结果表明，良好的一般认知能力（良好的整体认知水平）和较高的教育水平可以支持患者的语用能力。已经发现抑制过程可以预测患者理解比喻等比喻语言的能力，这可能与额叶功能障碍有关。以及个人理解力和生产能力的不足。我们的研究结果表明，良好的一般认知能力（良好的整体认知水平）和较高的教育水平可以支持患者的语用能力。已经发现抑制过程可以预测患者理解比喻等比喻语言的能力，这可能与额叶功能障碍有关。