NEURAL BASIS OF AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE

研究手语提供了一个独特的机会来洞察 从手语开始，语言的神经机制的本质 使用与口语不同的传播方式。 为了了解语言的神经机制在多大程度上 与情态无关，以及它们受情态限制的程度，我们 自然转向手语，因为通过他们的学习，我们可以开始 从总体上解决语言的大脑组织问题。我们 将我们创建时空模式数字记录的能力联系起来 手语理论驱动下的手语语言学分析 精神障碍与运动加工的心理物理学研究 四个系列研究中的脑损伤者。 手语的大脑功能。我们调查了手语 左侧单侧病变的聋人的手势能力 或右大脑半球，以揭示大脑的本质 视觉手势语言的组织。与 手语缺失与标准化失语的语言学分析 评估，我们采用理论驱动的测试进行处理 手语中的语言结构。另外，我们开始 研究潜在过程的皮质表现 在失聪的手语者中阅读。 动态视觉-运动表示法。我们直接比较语言上的 脑损伤者对空间轨迹的操纵 当它们起作用时，操纵这些相同基因座的能力 非语言的。在这样做的时候，我们调查是否有 根据功能对空间的不同心理表征 以及大脑是否遵守这些功能差异。 快速时态分析的专门化。对聋人手语者的研究， 对于语言处理依赖于视觉感知的人来说 改变刺激，将有助于阐明左半球的作用 专攻时态分析和语言处理。我们 脑病患者快速时间分析能力的研究 并将这种功能与大脑半球的模式联系起来 手语和口语的专门化。 非语言运动和空间处理的专业化。按顺序 了解手语处理的大脑组织及其 知觉基础，我们梳理出知觉与语言缺陷 在大脑受损的签名者身上，也应该提供一种新的 关于语言和动态事件的大脑功能的观点。我们 聋人手势障碍的脑部特化研究 非语言空间处理到具有挑战性和启发性的领域 运动处理。

The study of sign languages offers a unique opportunity for insight into the nature of neural mechanisms for language, since sign languages utilize a transmission modality different from that of spoken languages. To understand the extent to which neural mechanisms for language are modality independent, and the extent to which they are modality-bound, we naturally turn to sign languages because through their study we can begin to solve the problem of brain organization for language in general. We link our ability to create digital records of the spatiotemporal patterns of signing with theoretically driven linguistic analyses of sign language breakdown and with psychophysical studies of motion processing in brain-lesioned signers in four series of studies. Brain Function for Sign Language. We investigate the sign language capacities of deaf signers who have unilateral lesions in either the left or right cerebral hemisphere in order to uncover the nature of brain organization for a visual-gestural language. In conjunction with linguistic analyses of signing deficits and standardized aphasia assessments, we bring to bear theoretically-driven tests for processing linguistic structure in sign language. In addition, we begin investigating the cortical representation of the processes underlying reading in deaf signers. Dynamic Visuo-Motor Representations. We directly compare the linguistic manipulation of spatial loci by brain-lesioned signers with their capacities for manipulating these same loci when they function nonlinguistically. In so doing, we investigate whether there am differing mental representations of space depending upon the function subserved, and whether the brain honors these functional distinctions. Specialization for Rapid Temporal Analysis. Studies with deaf signers, for whom language processing relies on the perception of visually changing stimuli, will help clarify the role of left hemisphere specialization in temporal analysis and language processing. We investigate capacities for rapid temporal analysis in brain-lesioned signers and relate such function to patterns of hemispheric specialization for signed and spoken language. Specialization for Non-Language Motion and Spatial Processing. In order to understand brain organization for sign language processing and for its perceptual substrate, we tease apart perceptual from linguistic deficits in brain-lesioned signers in ways that should also provide a new perspective on brain function for language and for dynamic events. We extend the investigation of cerebral specialization in deaf signers for nonlanguage spatial processing to the challenging and revealing domain of motion processing.