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When a word will not come: describing around it with six questions — group, use, look, place, partner, first sound — so a list or message still works.
Paper packet. Every task here also exists on screen, where it is checked automatically; answers written on paper are not assessed by Nydus. When you are back at a device, enter your answers there.
You will describe a thing whose name will not come by answering six questions about it, and write a list line or message that someone else can act on without the word.
Everyone has had a word on the tip of the tongue: you know exactly what you mean, you may even know it starts with b, and the word will not come. The last lesson was about writing notes that make sense later. This one is about what to write when the word itself is missing. The people and lists are invented. This is optional practice alongside your own care, not treatment and not a measure of recovery. If anything about your memory, speech, energy or thinking is new or changing, tell your own clinicians. Sudden trouble speaking or understanding speech is different: it can be a sign of stroke, and the advice is to call 911 at once.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Tip of the tongue | Knowing a word, sometimes its first sound, while being unable to say it. |
| Circumlocution | Describing a thing in other words when its name will not come. |
| Feature | One fact about a thing: its group, use, look, place, partner or first sound. |
| Group | The kind of thing it is, such as kitchen tool or garden tool. |
| Near guess | A word that sounds or looks close to the missing one and can mislead a reader. |
| Speech-language pathologist | The clinician who assesses and treats speech and language difficulties. |
The support is a small card kept with the notepad or in a phone note, with six questions on it:
What group is it in? What is it for? What does it look like? Where is it found? What does it go with? What sound does it start with?
When a word will not come, you do not have to hunt for it. You answer the questions instead, and write the answers down. The card does the asking, so you do not have to remember what to ask while you are stuck.
Describing a thing when its name will not come is called circumlocution, literally talking around. It works for two reasons. First, a good description does the word's job: a store clerk can find a kitchen bowl with holes for draining pasta as easily as a colander. Second, the description often brings the word back, because it approaches the word from several sides at once.
The six questions are the sides. Group says what kind of thing it is. Use says what it is for, and is often the strongest clue. Looks like gives something to picture. Where found gives a place. Goes with names a partner, like batteries for a flashlight. First sound is a last resort, useful for yourself more than for others.
For someone else, group, use and one detail of the look are usually enough. Speech-language pathologists use a structured version of this questioning, called semantic feature analysis (Boyle and Coelho, 1995), in therapy for word-finding after stroke. A 2018 review of 21 studies with 55 participants (Efstratiadou and colleagues) found that naming of the practiced words improved for most participants, and that improvement on words not practiced was more limited. This lesson is not that therapy. It borrows the everyday idea for writing lists and messages. If word-finding is part of your recovery, your own speech-language pathologist is the person to guide the practice.
Another way: picture
A word is a house with six doors. When the front door, the name, is stuck, you can still get in by the side: what it is for, what it looks like, where it is kept. Once you are inside, the front door often opens from within.
Another way: steps
Here are the six questions answered for colander:
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Group | kitchen tool |
| Use | draining pasta or washing vegetables |
| Looks like | a metal bowl full of small holes |
| Where found | hanging by the stove; the kitchen aisle |
| Goes with | pasta pot, sink |
| First sound | k |
Notice that kitchen tool alone would fit a whisk, a ladle and a spatula. The group narrows the search, and the use and the look finish it.
A description on a list or in a message is read by someone who cannot ask you what you meant. Three habits help. Lead with the use: for draining pasta rules out most things at once. Add one thing they can see: a shape, a color, a size. Leave out the guesses: a near miss at the word, like fennel for funnel, sends a helper confidently the wrong way, while a cone for pouring oil into the car cannot be misread.
In conversation the same questions work out loud: It's the thing you use to... it looks like... you keep it in... Most listeners will offer the word before you finish.
Tip-of-the-tongue moments are ordinary. Alan S. Brown's 1991 review of the research, starting from Brown and McNeill's 1966 study, reported that they are nearly universal, happen about once a week in everyday life, become more common with age, are often set off by names, and frequently come with the first letter of the missing word. The review also found that about half resolve during the moment itself.
Take Ines, a fictional retiree writing a drugstore list for her neighbor. Thermometer will not come, and neither will tweezers. Instead of leaving a gap or writing that thing, she writes: medicine-aisle stick that shows your temperature and small metal pincers for splinters. Her neighbor comes back with both. By the time Ines has written the second line, the word tweezers has arrived, and she adds it in brackets. The description had already done its work.
Keep trying until the word comes. Straining for a word tends to bring back the same wrong one. Switching to the description is quicker and often frees the word.
A description is a failure to say it properly. A clear description gets the job done, and people use them all the time: the remote, the thing for the gutters.
The first sound is the best clue for someone else. It helps you; to a listener it starts with k is a puzzle. Use and look help them far more.
Stop hunting and answer the group.
Group: kitchen tool
The group sends the reader to the right aisle.
Answer the use.
Use: for draining pasta
The use rules out most other kitchen tools at once.
Add one detail of the look.
Looks like: a metal bowl full of small holes
A visible detail lets someone pick it off the shelf.
Write the line on the list.
Kitchen bowl with holes, for draining pasta (metal, medium)
The line works without the word, and the word can be added if it comes.
Answer the group and the use.
Group: electrical · Use: to plug in a lamp far from the outlet
The neighbor needs to know what job the thing does.
Add the look and where it might be kept.
Looks like: a long orange cable with a plug at one end and a socket at the other · Where: garage
The color and the two ends make it unmistakable.
Leave out the near guess.
not extension ladder? · not the long thing
A wrong word or a vague one would bring back the wrong item.
Write the message.
Hi Carl, could I borrow your long orange cable for plugging a lamp in far from the outlet? Thursday is fine. Thanks, June
Use and look together do the work of the missing word.
Answer the group and the use.
Group: desk tool · Use: joins sheets of paper
Group and use come first.
Add one detail of the look.
Looks like: presses a small metal pin through the paper
A detail someone could see finishes the description.
Write the line.
Walt cannot find the word *funnel* while writing a list for his neighbor to take to the hardware store. Which line would let the store clerk find the right thing?
Dee cannot find the word *stapler*. She writes: *the desk tool that joins sheets of paper with a metal pin; it sits by the printer.* Complete the check of her description against the six questions.
Mark the questions the description answers.
desk tool → group · joins sheets → use · metal pin → looks like · by the printer → where found
Each piece of the description answers one of the six questions.
Count the questions answered.
group, use, looks like, where found → a of the six
Group, use and one detail are usually enough for someone else to act.
Count the questions left unanswered.
goes with, first sound → b left
Those two are the ones to try next if the word itself is still wanted.
Match each description to the word it describes.
| colander | umbrella | stapler | hand rake | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A kitchen bowl with holes, for draining pasta | ||||
| Folds up by the door, keeps the rain off you | ||||
| Desk tool that presses a metal pin through paper | ||||
| A small metal fork from the shed for loosening soil |
Rita describes an *umbrella* without the word. Say which question each piece of her description answers.
| Question it answers | |
|---|---|
| something you carry | |
| keeps the rain off | |
| cloth on metal ribs that folds up | |
| in the stand by the front door | |
| raincoat and boots |
Two kitchen words will not come: *colander* and *whisk*. Link each feature to every word it describes.
This task has no paper form; do it on a device.
A fictional shopping list was written with descriptions where the words would not come. Name the thing each line describes.
| The word | |
|---|---|
| kitchen tool with sharp holes for cheese | |
| small garden tool, a pointed scoop for loosening soil | |
| soft paper on a roll, for the bathroom | |
| wide sticky tape for sealing boxes |
Ines is writing a list for her neighbor, who is going to the drugstore. Three words will not come. For each, choose the line to write.
| Line to write | |
|---|---|
| the word *thermometer* | |
| the word *tweezers* | |
| the word *lip balm* |
Lesson test: one question per skill, one attempt each, no hints. Your answers are checked when you submit.
The word *flashlight* will not come. Build a description of it: choose the entry that answers each question.
| Entry | |
|---|---|
| Group | |
| Use | |
| Looks like | |
| Where found | |
| Goes with | |
| First sound |
Copy the six questions onto a card and keep it with your notepad. Next time a word sticks, write the group, the use and one detail, and carry on. Next: planning a week so the heavy days are spread out. This is optional practice alongside your own care, not treatment and not a measure of recovery. If anything about your memory, speech, energy or thinking is new or changing, tell your own clinicians. You can stop at any point: close the page, and it reopens where you left it.
12. Your turn: the word *stapler*, step 3
Desk tool that joins sheets of paper with a metal pin
Group, use and a visible detail are enough for anyone else to act on.