Radboud University, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
Neuropsychologia. 2010 Feb;48(3):774-81. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2009.09.019. Epub 2009 Sep 24.
Words denoting manipulable objects activate sensorimotor brain areas, likely reflecting action experience with the denoted objects. In particular, these sensorimotor lexical representations have been found to reflect the way in which an object is used. In the current paper we present data from two experiments (one behavioral and one neuroimaging) in which we investigate whether body schema information, putatively necessary for interacting with functional objects, is also recruited during lexical processing. To this end, we presented participants with words denoting objects that are typically brought towards or away from the body (e.g., cup or key, respectively). We hypothesized that objects typically brought to a location on the body (e.g., cup) are relatively more reliant on body schema representations, since the final goal location of the cup (i.e., the mouth) is represented primarily through posture and body co-ordinates. In contrast, objects typically brought to a location away from the body (e.g., key) are relatively more dependent on visuo-spatial representations, since the final goal location of the key (i.e., a keyhole) is perceived visually. The behavioral study showed that prior planning of a movement along an axis towards and away from the body facilitates processing of words with a congruent action semantic feature (i.e., preparation of movement towards the body facilitates processing of cup.). In an fMRI study we showed that words denoting objects brought towards the body engage the resources of brain areas involved in the processing information about human bodies (i.e., the extra-striate body area, middle occipital gyrus and inferior parietal lobe) relatively more than words denoting objects typically brought away from the body. The results provide converging evidence that body schema are implicitly activated in processing lexical information.
表示可操纵物体的词激活了感觉运动脑区，这可能反映了人们对所指物体的动作经验。特别是，这些感觉运动词汇表征反映了物体被使用的方式。在当前的论文中，我们呈现了两个实验（一个行为实验和一个神经影像学实验）的数据，在这些实验中，我们研究了与功能性物体交互所需的身体图式信息是否也会在词汇处理过程中被招募。为此，我们向参与者展示了表示物体的单词，这些物体通常被带到身体附近或远离身体（例如，杯子或钥匙）。我们假设，通常被带到身体某个位置的物体（例如杯子）相对更依赖于身体图式的表示，因为杯子的最终目标位置（即嘴）主要通过姿势和身体坐标来表示。相比之下，通常被带到身体远处的物体（例如钥匙）相对更依赖于视空间的表示，因为钥匙的最终目标位置（即钥匙孔）是通过视觉感知的。行为研究表明，沿身体前后轴进行运动的预先计划有助于处理具有一致动作语义特征的单词（即，朝向身体的运动准备促进了杯子的处理）。在 fMRI 研究中，我们发现表示被带到身体附近的物体的单词相对更多地激活了参与处理关于人体信息的大脑区域的资源（即，额外纹状体区、中枕叶回和下顶叶），而表示通常被带到身体远处的物体的单词则较少激活这些区域。结果提供了一致的证据，表明在处理词汇信息时，身体图式会被隐含地激活。
