Cross-Linguistic Studies of Aphasia

失语症的跨语言研究使我们能够从语言特定的内容中分离出普遍的机制。 通过揭示在正常和异常条件下可能发生的变化范围，跨语言研究还解决了行为和神经可塑性的关键问题。 在这个建议中，我们概述了新的比较研究的语言处理和语言故障的失语症患者和对照组在三种语言（英语、意大利语和汉语）在词汇和语法结构上有很大的不同（例如，词序变化量，屈折形态，成分省略，单词和语素的一致性与不规则性，词汇歧义的可能性，和词的内部结构）。 患者研究（病变-行为映射的经典方法）得到了使用相同三种语言对正常人进行的大脑成像研究（使用功能性磁共振成像，或fMRI）的补充。 同样的材料被用于行为和功能磁共振成像实验，在“在线”，计算机控制的任务，产生有关单词和句子处理的时间动态信息。 非语言控制任务的设计是为了在关键方面（视觉，听觉和运动激活;对记忆，注意力，决策的要求）匹配语言任务，测试关于模态和感觉运动需求对语言激活（功能磁共振成像）和语言故障（损伤研究）的贡献的假设。 我们还扩大了“正常对照”的概念，包括正常测试的比较不利的处理条件下（知觉退化，时间压缩，认知过载），发现“断点”在处理和“模拟”患者的处理障碍。 文字和图片刺激的选择是基于大量的规范信息收集在所有网站在最后一个供资周期。 研究中的失语症亚组包括不流利的布罗卡失语症患者、流利的韦尼克失语症患者和很少犯明显的语法错误但仍然难以“找到正确的单词”的命名障碍患者。认识到传统失语症分类的局限性，我们还采取了一种新的多变量方法，在连续的多维症状空间内分析患者在实验中的表现，通过使用大型档案数据集（每种语言超过200名患者）为每种语言定义。 结果被解释在合并的两个理论框架：竞争模型（一个处理模型，假设在分布式，概率表示的互动激活）和体现理论（神经组织语言的理论）。

Cross-linguistic studies of aphasia permit us to separate universal mechanisms from language-specific content. By uncovering the range of variations that are possible under normal and abnormal conditions, cross-language studies also address the critical issues of behavioral and neural plasticity. In this proposal, we outline new comparative studies of language processing and language breakdown in aphasic patients and controls in three languages (English, Italian and Chinese) that differ dramatically in their lexical and grammatical structure (e.g. amounts of word order variation, inflectional morphology, constituent omission, consistency vs. irregularity of words and morphemes, potential for lexical ambiguity, and the internal structure of words). Patient studies (the classical method of lesion-behavior mapping) are complemented by brain-imaging studies of normals in the same three languages (using functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI). The same materials are used in behavioral and fMRI experiments, in 'on-line', computer- controlled tasks that yield information about the temporal dynamics of word and sentence processing. Nonverbal control tasks are designed to match linguistic tasks in key respects (visual, auditory, and motor activation; demands on memory, attention, decision-making), testing hypotheses about the contributions of modality and sensorimotor demands to language activation (fMRI) and language breakdown (lesion studies). We also expand the concept of "normal control" to include comparisons of normal tested under adverse processing conditions (perceptual degradation, temporal compression, cognitive overload), to uncover 'breakpoints' in processing and to 'simulate' processing disorders in patients. Selection of word and picture stimuli is based on massive norming information collected at all sites in the last funding cycle. The aphasia subgroups under study include nonfluent Broca's aphasics, fluent Wernicke's aphasics, and anomic patients who commit few overt grammatical errors but still struggle to 'find the right word'. Acknowledging the limitations of traditional aphasia categories, we also take a new multivariate approach, analyzing patients' performance on experiments within a continuous, multidimensional symptom space, defined for each language by using large archival data sets (more than 200 patients per language). Results are interpreted within a merger of two theoretical frameworks: the Competition Model (a processing model that assumes interactive activation over distributed, probabilistic representations) and Embodiment Theory (a theory of neural organization for language).