We present two ERP studies on the processing of word order variations in Japanese, a language that is suited to shedding further light on the implications of word order freedom for neurocognitive approaches to sentence comprehension. Experiment 1 used auditory presentation and revealed that initial accusative objects elicit increased processing…

It has been hypothesized that nouns and verbs are processed within relatively separable semantic memory networks. Although abnormal semantic processing is a common feature of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders, no prior studies have specifically examined the comparability of noun and verb generation deficits in schizophrenia. In the current study,…

The role of sensory-motor representations in object recognition was investigated in experiments involving AD, a patient with mild visual agnosia who was impaired in the recognition of visually presented living as compared to non-living entities. AD named visually presented items for which sensory-motor information was available significantly more…

The current study was conducted to test the premise that computer-based intervention that targets auditory temporal processing combined with language exercises (Fast ForWord[R]) is effective in remediating children with disorders of language and reading. Sixty-five middle school struggling readers were randomly assigned to one of five groups and…

EEG was recorded as adults watched short segments of spontaneous discourse in which the speaker's gestures and utterances contained complementary information. Videos were followed by one of four types of picture probes: cross-modal related probes were congruent with both speech and gestures; speech-only related probes were congruent with…

A quantitative method is introduced for detecting and correcting artifactual signal changes in BOLD time series data arising from the magnetic field warping caused by motion of the articulatory apparatus when speaking aloud, with extensions to detection of subvocal articulatory activity during silent reading. Whole-head images allow the large,…

Deviances in early event-related potential (ERP) components reflecting auditory and phonological processing are well-documented in children at familial risk for dyslexia. However, little is known about brain responses which index processing in other linguistic domains such as lexicon, semantics and syntax in this group. The present study…

This study addresses continuing controversies concerning the nature of semantic impairment in early dementia of the Alzheimer type (DAT), and the relationship between conceptual knowledge and picture naming. A series of analyses of fine-grained feature knowledge data show that: (1) distinctive features of concepts were more vulnerable than shared;…

The general magnocellular theory postulates that dyslexia is the consequence of a multimodal deficit in the processing of transient and dynamic stimuli. In the auditory modality, this deficit has been hypothesized to interfere with accurate speech perception, and subsequently disrupt the development of phonological and later reading and spelling…

The purpose of the present study was to introduce a Swedish version of the Boston Naming Test and to offer normative data based on a sample of native Swedish-speaking healthy adults stratified concerning age, gender, and length of education. The subjects were assessed with other lexical tests and half of the group also performed tests of global…

Emerging evidence suggests that a traumatic brain injury (TBI) in childhood may disrupt the ability to abstract the central meaning or gist-based memory from connected language (discourse). The current study adopts a novel approach to elucidate the role of immediate and working memory processes in producing a cohesive and coherent gist-based text…

The present study evaluated cerebral lateralization during Raven's progressive matrices (RPM) paradigm in female and male subjects. Bilateral simultaneous transcranial Doppler (TCD) ultrasound was used to measure mean blood flow velocities (MBFV) in the right and left middle cerebral arteries (MCAs) in 24 (15 females and 9 males) right-handed…

Cognitive processing of lexical and sub-lexical stimuli was compared for good and poor adult phonological decoders. Sixteen good decoders and 16 poor decoders, average age 19 years, silently read 150 randomly computer presented sentences ending in incongruous regular, irregular, or nonwords and 100 congruent filler sentences.…

We attempted to simulate the main features of letter-by-letter (LBL) dyslexia in normal readers through stimulus degradation (i.e. contrast reduction and removal of high spatial frequencies). The results showed the word length and the letter confusability effects characteristic of LBL dyslexia. However, the interaction of letter confusability and…

This study evaluates whether tip of the tongue experiences (TOTs) are caused by a more accessible word which blocks retrieval of the target word, especially for older adults. In a ''competitor priming'' paradigm, young and older adults produced the name of a famous character (e.g., Eliza Doolittle) in response to a question and subsequently named…