Vascular responses to syntactic processing: event-related fMRI study of relative clauses.
Event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to investigate the localization of syntactic processing in sentence comprehension. Matched pairs of sentences containing identical lexical items were compared. One member of the pair consisted of a syntactically simpler sentence, containing a subject relativized clause. The second member of the pair consisted of a syntactically more complex sentence, containing an object relativized clause. Ten subjects made plausibility judgments about the sentences, which were presented one word at a time on a computer screen. There was an increase in BOLD hemodynamic signal in response to the presentation of all sentences compared to fixation in both right and left occipital cortex, the left perisylvian cortex, and the left premotor and motor areas. BOLD signal increased in the left angular gyrus when subjects processed the complex portion of syntactically more complex sentences. This study shows that a hemodynamic response associated with processing the syntactically complex portions of a sentence can be localized to one part of the dominant perisylvian association cortex.
Caplan
David
D
Neuropsychology Laboratory, Department of Neurology, Vincent Burnham 827, Massachusetts General Hospital, Fruit Street, Boston, MA 02114, USA. Caplan@helix.mgh.harvard.edu
Vijayan
Sujith
S
Kuperberg
Gina
G
West
Caroline
C
Waters
Gloria
G
Greve
Doug
D
Dale
Anders M
AM
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001519:Behavior; D001921:Brain / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000098:blood supply / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D003626:Data Display; D006801:Humans; D007807:Language Tests; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods; D010865:Pilot Projects; D011930:Reaction Time; D011932:Reading; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000502:physiology*