Final answer:
Damage to Wernicke's area results in receptive aphasia, which impairs the ability to understand language, making it difficult or impossible to comprehend spoken and written speech.
Step-by-step explanation:
When Wernicke's area is damaged, it becomes difficult or impossible to understand language. This condition is known as receptive aphasia or Wernicke's aphasia. Unlike expressive aphasia, which results from damage to Broca's area and affects speech production, receptive aphasia impacts the comprehension of language. Individuals may still be able to produce speech, but it often lacks meaning, and they have trouble understanding what is being said to them, or even their own speech. This type of aphasia highlights the crucial role Wernicke's area plays in the integration of multimodal language functions, including the processing and interpretation of both spoken and written language.