Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory of Reading and Development in Children and Adolescents, South China Normal University, Ministry of Education, Guangzhou 510631, China; Center for Studies of Psychological Application, South China Normal University, 510631, Guangzhou, China; Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China; School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China.
Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory of Reading and Development in Children and Adolescents, South China Normal University, Ministry of Education, Guangzhou 510631, China; Center for Studies of Psychological Application, South China Normal University, 510631, Guangzhou, China; Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China; School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China.
Brain Lang. 2024 Nov;258:105485. doi: 10.1016/j.bandl.2024.105485. Epub 2024 Oct 9.
Previous studies suggest that semantic concepts are characterized by high-dimensional neural representations and that language proficiency affects semantic processing. However, it is not clear whether language proficiency modulates the dimensional representations of semantic concepts at the neural level. To address this question, the present study adopted principal component analysis (PCA) and representational similarity analysis (RSA) to examine the differences in representational dimensionalities (RDs) and in semantic representations between words in highly proficient (Chinese) and less proficient (English) language. PCA results revealed that language proficiency increased the dimensions of lexical representations in the left inferior frontal gyrus, temporal pole, inferior temporal gyrus, supramarginal gyrus, angular gyrus, and fusiform gyrus. RSA results further showed that these regions represented semantic information and that higher semantic representations were observed in highly proficient language relative to less proficient language. These results suggest that language proficiency is associated with the neural representational dimensionality of semantic concepts.
先前的研究表明，语义概念的特征是具有高维的神经表示，并且语言熟练程度会影响语义处理。然而，目前尚不清楚语言熟练程度是否会在神经水平上调节语义概念的维度表示。为了解决这个问题，本研究采用主成分分析（PCA）和表示相似性分析（RSA）来检查高度熟练（中文）和不太熟练（英文）语言中的单词在表示维度（RD）和语义表示方面的差异。PCA 结果表明，语言熟练程度增加了左额下回、颞极、下颞叶、缘上回、角回和梭状回的词汇表示维度。RSA 结果进一步表明，这些区域表示语义信息，并且在高度熟练的语言中比在不太熟练的语言中观察到更高的语义表示。这些结果表明，语言熟练程度与语义概念的神经表示维度有关。
