Is the Motor System Necessary for Processing Action and Abstract Emotion Words? Evidence from Focal Brain Lesions.
Is the Motor System Necessary for Processing Action and Abstract Emotion Words? Evidence from Focal Brain Lesions.
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DOI：
10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01661
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发表时间：
2015
影响因子：
3.8
通讯作者：
Pulvermüller F
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Dreyer FR;Frey D;Arana S;von Saldern S;Picht T;Vajkoczy P;Pulvermüller F
神经影像学和神经心理学实验表明，包括运动和躯体感觉区在内的模态偏好皮层有助于动作相关具体词的语义加工。尽管如此，感觉运动区在处理抽象意义中的可能作用仍然存在争议。最近的fMRI研究表明，左侧感觉运动皮层参与了抽象情感词的处理（例如，“爱”），这类似于动作词的激活模式。但是，这些激活的区域真的是处理与动作相关的抽象词汇所必需的吗？目前的研究，现在调查的文字加工的两名患者患有局灶性脑损伤的左额中枢运动系统。一个快速的词汇决策任务，精心匹配的词组表明，从不同的语义类别-相关的食物，动物，工具，和抽象的情感概念-名词的识别受到不同的影响。手部区域附近背外侧中央感觉运动系统受损的患者HS在识别工具词方面表现出类别特异性缺陷，而左侧补充运动区中心受损的患者CA主要在抽象情感词处理方面受损。这些结果表明，运动皮层在动作相关的对象概念和抽象情感概念的语义处理中的因果作用，因此表明，以前发现活跃在动作相关的和抽象的文字处理的运动区可以在文字识别的意义特定的必要作用。观察到的解离的类别特定的性质是很难调和的想法，感觉运动系统在某种程度上外围或“副现象”的意义和概念处理。相反，我们的研究结果是一致的主张，认知是植根于行动和感知，并基于分布式动作感知电路达到模态优先皮层。
Neuroimaging and neuropsychological experiments suggest that modality-preferential cortices, including motor- and somatosensory areas, contribute to the semantic processing of action related concrete words. Still, a possible role of sensorimotor areas in processing abstract meaning remains under debate. Recent fMRI studies indicate an involvement of the left sensorimotor cortex in the processing of abstract-emotional words (e.g., “love”) which resembles activation patterns seen for action words. But are the activated areas indeed necessary for processing action-related and abstract words? The current study now investigates word processing in two patients suffering from focal brain lesion in the left frontocentral motor system. A speeded Lexical Decision Task on meticulously matched word groups showed that the recognition of nouns from different semantic categories – related to food, animals, tools, and abstract-emotional concepts – was differentially affected. Whereas patient HS with a lesion in dorsolateral central sensorimotor systems next to the hand area showed a category-specific deficit in recognizing tool words, patient CA suffering from lesion centered in the left supplementary motor area was primarily impaired in abstract-emotional word processing. These results point to a causal role of the motor cortex in the semantic processing of both action-related object concepts and abstract-emotional concepts and therefore suggest that the motor areas previously found active in action-related and abstract word processing can serve a meaning-specific necessary role in word recognition. The category-specific nature of the observed dissociations is difficult to reconcile with the idea that sensorimotor systems are somehow peripheral or ‘epiphenomenal’ to meaning and concept processing. Rather, our results are consistent with the claim that cognition is grounded in action and perception and based on distributed action perception circuits reaching into modality-preferential cortex.