Palilalia

Palilalia

Palilalia is a disorder of articulation characterized by the involuntary repetition of syllables within a word, whole words, or phrases, hence a reiterative speech disorder. The term stutter may be used for repetition of single syllables, and the term palilogia has sometimes been used for the repetition of phrases, to distinguish from palilalia. These phenomena may be encountered in:

Parkinson’s disease (along with bradylalia, slowness of speech) Progressive supranuclear palsy
Gilles de la Tourette syndrome (along with vocal and motor tics) Pick’s disease, as part of the so-called PES syndrome (palilalia,
echolalia, stereotypy) or the PEMA syndrome (palilalia, echolalia, mutism, amimia)
Late stages of Alzheimer’s disease
Postencephalitic parkinsonism (von Economo’s disease) Fahr’s disease (bilateral basal ganglia calcification)
Normal finding in children below the age of about six years

In pathological states, palilalia may reflect difficulty in set shifting, as seen in frontal lobe (frontal convexity) syndromes.

Cross References

Bradylalia; Echolalia; Frontal lobe syndromes; Hypomimia; Mutism; Parkinsonism;Stereotypy; Stutter; Tic