In this study, the first to explore the cortical correlates of signed language (SL) processing under point-light display conditions, the observer identified either a signer or a lexical sign from a display in which different signers were seen producing a number of different individual signs. Many of the regions activated by point-light under these…

A growing body of literature investigating the neural correlates of emotion word processing has emerged in recent years. Written words have been shown to represent a suitable means to study emotion processing and most importantly to address the distinct and interactive contributions of the two dimensions of emotion: valence and arousal. The aim of…

Language acquisition is a complex process that requires the synergic involvement of different cognitive functions, which include extracting and storing the words of the language and their embedded rules for progressive acquisition of grammatical information. As has been shown in other fields that study learning processes, synchronization…

The present study aimed to uncover the neural activity associated with specific in-group and out-group word related stimuli, to examine the neuroanatomical basis of group membership concept representation, and investigate to what extent neural processes represent "in-group" differently from "out-group". Participants' brain activity was measured…

Patients with primary progressive aphasia (PPA) vary considerably in terms of which brain regions are impacted, as well as in the extent to which syntactic processing is impaired. Here we review the literature on the neural basis of syntactic deficits in PPA. Structural and functional imaging studies have most consistently associated syntactic…

Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) perform worse than controls when listening to speech in a temporally modulated noise (Alcantara, Weisblatt, Moore, & Bolton, 2004; Groen et al., 2009). The current study examined whether this is due to poor auditory temporal-envelope processing. Temporal modulation transfer functions were measured in…

We applied near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) and electrocorticography (ECoG) recordings during cortical stimulation to a temporal lobe epilepsy patient who underwent subdural electrode implantation. Using NIRS, changes in blood concentrations of oxyhemoglobin (HbO[subscript 2]) and deoxyhemoglobin (HbR) during cortical stimulation of the left…

Models of speaking distinguish producing meaning, words and syntax as three different linguistic components of speaking. Nevertheless, little is known about the brain's integrated neuronal infrastructure for speech production. We investigated semantic, lexical and syntactic aspects of speaking using fMRI. In a picture description task, we…

We employ a linear mixed-effects model to estimate the effects of visual form and the linguistic properties of Chinese characters on M100 and M170 MEG responses from single-trial data of Chinese and English speakers in a Chinese lexical decision task. Cortically constrained minimum-norm estimation is used to compute the activation of M100 and M170…

Current research on analogy processing assumes that different conceptual relations are treated similarly. However, just as words and concepts are related in distinct ways, different kinds of analogies may employ distinct types of relationships. An important distinction in how words are related is the difference between associative (dog-bone) and…

Suppressing irrelevant words is essential to successful speech production and is expected to involve general control mechanisms that reduce interference from task-unrelated processing. To investigate the neural mechanisms that suppress visual word interference, we used fMRI and a Stroop task, using a block design with an event-related analysis.…

A meaningful interaction with our environment relies on the ability to focus on relevant sensory input and to ignore irrelevant information, i.e. top-down control and attention processes are employed to select from competing stimuli following internal goals. In this, the demands for the recruitment of top-down control processes depend on the…

Is language processing universal? How do the specific properties of each language influence the way it is processed? In this study, we compare the neural correlates of morphological processing in Hebrew--a Semitic language with a rich and systematic morphology, to those revealed in English--an Indo-European language with a linear morphology. Using…

Pronouns are extraordinarily common in daily language yet little is known about the neural mechanisms that support decisions about pronoun reference. We propose a large-scale neural network for resolving pronoun reference that consists of two components. First, a core language network in peri-Sylvian cortex supports syntactic and semantic…

One of the most challenging tasks in neuroscience in language studies, is investigation of the brain's ability to integrate and process information. This task can only be successfully addressed by applying various assessment techniques integrated into a multimodal approach. Each of these techniques has its advantages and disadvantages, but help to…