Department of Psychology, Durham University, United Kingdom.
Department of Psychology, Durham University, United Kingdom.
Brain Stimul. 2012 Jul;5(3):347-353. doi: 10.1016/j.brs.2011.06.004. Epub 2011 Jul 21.
Prosody conveys information about the emotional state and intention of others. Lesion studies have shown that damage to the right posterior temporal region is associated with prosody decoding deficits. Dissimilarly to findings from lesion studies, neuroimaging data show substantial bilateral peri-Sylvian activation.
This study aimed to investigate the involvement of the left and right superior temporal gyrus (STG) in prosodic and semantic processing using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). These two regions of interest were chosen for their correspondence to Wernicke's area in the left hemisphere and its analog in the right.
Offline TMS with a stimulation frequency of 1 Hz and intensity of 60% of stimulator output (approximately 1.1 Tesla) with one pulse applied per second for 10 minutes (600 pulses) was performed. Directly after TMS on the right STG, the left STG or sham-stimulation, participants completed a prosody decoding or a semantic judgment task (whether the tone/meaning was happy or sad).
Reaction times (RT) for the prosodic task were significantly slower when TMS was applied in the right STG in comparison to left STG and sham conditions. TMS over both right and left STG delayed RT in the semantic task, significantly when the tone of voice was incongruent with the meaning.
Our data strongly suggests that left temporal regions are not crucial to the basic task of prosody decoding per se; however, the analogous region on the right is. Hence, involvement of the left STG in prosodic decoding revealed in previous imaging data is incidental.
韵律传达了有关他人情绪状态和意图的信息。病变研究表明，右侧颞后区域的损伤与韵律解码缺陷有关。与病变研究的发现不同，神经影像学数据显示双侧颞旁区广泛激活。
本研究旨在使用经颅磁刺激（TMS）研究左、右颞上回（STG）在韵律和语义处理中的参与情况。选择这两个感兴趣的区域是因为它们与左半球的威尼克区及其右侧对应物相对应。
离线 TMS 刺激频率为 1 Hz，刺激强度为刺激器输出的 60%（约 1.1 特斯拉），每秒施加一个脉冲，持续 10 分钟（600 个脉冲）。在右侧 STG 直接进行 TMS 后，参与者完成韵律解码或语义判断任务（音高/意思是快乐还是悲伤）。
与左 STG 和假刺激相比，右侧 STG 接受 TMS 时，韵律任务的反应时间（RT）明显变慢。双侧 STG 的 TMS 均延迟了语义任务的 RT，当语音与语义不一致时更为显著。
我们的数据强烈表明，左颞区对于韵律解码的基本任务本身并不是至关重要的；然而，右侧的对应区域是。因此，先前的影像学数据中揭示的左 STG 在韵律解码中的参与是偶然的。
