Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, CEA, INSERM, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris-Saclay, NeuroSpin Center, 91191 Gif/Yvette, France.
Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, CEA, INSERM, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris-Saclay, NeuroSpin Center, 91191 Gif/Yvette, France.
Neuroimage. 2018 Feb 15;167:151-161. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.11.040. Epub 2017 Nov 21.
During sentence processing, areas of the left superior temporal sulcus, inferior frontal gyrus and left basal ganglia exhibit a systematic increase in brain activity as a function of constituent size, suggesting their involvement in the computation of syntactic and semantic structures. Here, we asked whether these areas play a universal role in language and therefore contribute to the processing of non-spoken sign language. Congenitally deaf adults who acquired French sign language as a first language and written French as a second language were scanned while watching sequences of signs in which the size of syntactic constituents was manipulated. An effect of constituent size was found in the basal ganglia, including the head of the caudate and the putamen. A smaller effect was also detected in temporal and frontal regions previously shown to be sensitive to constituent size in written language in hearing French subjects (Pallier et al., 2011). When the deaf participants read sentences versus word lists, the same network of language areas was observed. While reading and sign language processing yielded identical effects of linguistic structure in the basal ganglia, the effect of structure was stronger in all cortical language areas for written language relative to sign language. Furthermore, cortical activity was partially modulated by age of acquisition and reading proficiency. Our results stress the important role of the basal ganglia, within the language network, in the representation of the constituent structure of language, regardless of the input modality.
在句子处理过程中，左颞上回、额下回和基底节的区域随着成分大小的增加而表现出系统的大脑活动增加，表明它们参与了句法和语义结构的计算。在这里，我们询问这些区域是否在语言中发挥普遍作用，从而有助于非口语手语的处理。作为第一语言习得法国手语并作为第二语言习得书面法语的先天性聋人成年人在观看大小成分被操纵的手语序列时被扫描。在基底节中发现了成分大小的影响，包括尾状核头和壳核。在听觉法语受试者中，先前在书面语言中对成分大小敏感的颞叶和额叶区域也检测到较小的影响（Pallier 等人，2011）。当聋人参与者阅读句子与单词列表时，观察到相同的语言区域网络。虽然阅读和手语处理在基底节中产生了相同的语言结构效应，但与手语相比，书面语言的所有皮质语言区域的结构效应更强。此外，皮质活动部分受到习得年龄和阅读熟练程度的调节。我们的结果强调了基底节在语言网络中对语言成分结构表示的重要作用，无论输入方式如何。
