title: Laterality and unilateral deafness: Patients with congenital right ear deafness do not develop atypical language dominance.
abstract: Auditory speech perception, speech production and reading lateralize to the left hemisphere in the majority of healthy right-handers. In this study, we investigated to what extent sensory input underlies the side of language dominance. We measured the lateralization of the three core subprocesses of language in patients who had profound hearing loss in the right ear from birth and in matched control subjects. They took part in a semantic decision listening task involving speech and sound stimuli (auditory perception), a word generation task (speech production) and a passive reading task (reading). The results show that a lack of sensory auditory input on the right side, which is strongly connected to the contralateral left hemisphere, does not lead to atypical lateralization of speech perception. Speech production and reading were also typically left lateralized in all but one patient, contradicting previous small scale studies. Other factors such as genetic constraints presumably overrule the role of sensory input in the development of (a)typical language lateralization.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University, Belgium.
authors.forename: Lise
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Van der Haegen
authors.affiliation: Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Ghent University Hospital, Ghent, Belgium.
authors.forename: Frederic
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Acke
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University, Belgium.
authors.forename: Guy
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Vingerhoets
authors.affiliation: Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Ghent University Hospital, Ghent, Belgium.
authors.forename: Ingeborg
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Dhooge
authors.affiliation: Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Ghent University Hospital, Ghent, Belgium.
authors.forename: Els
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: De Leenheer
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Key Laboratory of Brain Functional Genomics, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China; NYU-ECNU Institute of Brain and Cognitive Science, NYU Shanghai, 200062 Shanghai, China. Electronic address: qcai@psy.ecnu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Cai
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University, Belgium.
authors.forename: Marc
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Brysbaert
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001299:Audiometry; D001921:Brain / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000254:growth & development / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology*; D046088:Hearing Loss, Unilateral / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007807:Language Tests; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009473:Neuronal Plasticity; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology; D012683:Sensory Deprivation / Q000502:physiology; D013060:Speech / Q000502:physiology; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology
keywords: Deafness; Hemispheric asymmetry; Reading; Speech perception; Speech production