Hemispheric specialization for reading.
Behavioral laterality tasks with linguistic stimuli were used to assess the differential processing efficiencies of the cerebral hemispheres in right- and left-handed adults. Findings from a lateralized lexical decision task with concrete nouns supported Zaidel's (1983) "direct access" model of hemispheric functioning. A dual task consisting of oral and silent reading indicated that the right hand was significantly more disrupted than the left during unimanual finger tapping; however, some bilateral interference was observed. Taken together the findings suggest that although the left hemisphere was relatively more efficient, the right hemisphere was dynamically involved in the reading process.
Waldie
K E
KE
Department of Preventive and Social Medicine, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. kwaldie@gandalf.otago.ac.nz
Mosley
J L
JL
D000328:Adult; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000502:physiology; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010700:Phonetics; D011932:Reading; D012660:Semantics