The role of motion direction selective extrastriate regions in reading: a transcranial magnetic stimulation study.
Why reading ability is correlated with motion processing ability is perplexing. Activity in motion direction processing regions (Area V5/MT+) was perturbed by means of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) to examine its effect on reading. A functional probe (significant shortening of the motion aftereffect) was used to identify Area V5/MT+. Right-handed participants (8 m, 8 f) received three 7.5 min blocks of rTMS, after which two phonological and one orthographic reading tasks were administered. Application of rTMS to Area V5/MT+ (as compared to a non-rTMS baseline) significantly decreased performance only during non-word naming. The pattern of naming errors and the absence of deficits on the second phonological task were not consistent with a role for Area V5/MT+ in phonological decoding. Instead, its role in reading may be limited to image stabilization and/or letter localization.
Liederman
Jacqueline
J
Brain, Behavior and Cognition Program, Boston University, 64 Cummington Street, MA 02215, USA. liederma@bu.edu
McGraw Fisher
Janet
J
Schulz
Marcela
M
Maxwell
Carolyn
C
Théoret
Hugo
H
Pascual-Leone
Alvaro
A
D000328:Adult; D003342:Corpus Striatum / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009039:Motion Perception; D011932:Reading; D050781:Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation / Q000295:instrumentation*