The neural bases of sentence comprehension: a fMRI examination of syntactic and lexical processing
The neural bases of sentence comprehension: a fMRI examination of syntactic and lexical processing
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DOI：
10.1093/cercor/11.3.223
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发表时间：
2001-03-01
期刊：
影响因子：
3.7
通讯作者：
Just, MA
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Keller, TA;Carpenter, PA;Just, MA
功能性神经影像学的挑战之一是了解阅读理解的组成过程是如何从大脑区域网络的神经活动中产生的。本研究采用功能磁共振成像（fMRI）技术，通过独立控制词汇和句法加工过程中的认知需求，来研究阅读理解中的词汇和句法加工过程。在与早期的研究建立了一致性之后，该研究表明左侧大脑外侧裂周语言区参与了词汇访问和句法处理，该研究产生了新的发现，在两个方面令人惊讶：（i）词汇和句法因素不仅影响单个区域，而且影响左半球区域网络的激活，这表明，改变给定过程所施加的计算负荷会在许多合作领域产生级联效应;以及（ii）词汇和句法因素通常在确定每个受影响区域的激活量时相互作用，这表明，在不同语言水平上运作的理解过程可能仍然会利用大脑皮层资源的共享基础设施。结果表明，句子理解中的许多过程涉及多个大脑区域，并且许多大脑区域有助于多个理解过程。这意味着语言网络由大脑区域组成，每个区域都有多个相对的专业化，并参与广泛的区域间合作。
One of the challenges to functional neuroimaging is to understand how the component processes of reading comprehension emerge from the neural activity in a network of brain regions. In this study, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to examine lexical and syntactic processing in reading comprehension by independently manipulating the cognitive demand on each of the two processes of interest. After establishing a consistency with earlier research showing the involvement of the left perisylvian language areas in both lexical access and syntactic processing, the study produced new findings that are surprising in two ways: (i) the lexical and syntactic factors each impact not just individual areas, but they affect the activation in a network of left-hemisphere areas, suggesting that changing the computational load imposed by a given process produces a cascade of effects in a number of collaborating areas; and (ii) the lexical and syntactic factors usually interact in determining the amount of activation in each affected area, suggesting that comprehension processes that operate on different levels of language may nevertheless draw on a shared infrastructure of cortical resources. The results suggest that many processes in sentence comprehension involve multiple brain regions, and that many brain regions contribute to more than one comprehension process. The implication is that the language network consists of brain areas which each have multiple relative specializations and which engage in extensive interarea collaborations.