Reading relies on a left-lateralized brain system, including occipito-temporal (OTC), temporo-parietal, and inferior frontal (IFC) cortices. Neuroimaging studies have investigated whether activation in these cortices is modulated by a language's orthographic depth (consistency of grapheme-to-phoneme conversion). In Spanish-English bilinguals, some but not all studies have reported activation differences between the two languages during reading. Here, we studied Spanish-English early bilingual adults living in the United States (N = 25; 17 females, 8 males). We examined local activity, functional connectivity, and spatially distributed activity patterns during English and Spanish word reading. We found overlap in local activity for the two languages in the left IFC, but no differences in activation between them and few differences in functional connectivity (none of which were in pairs of regions known to be involved in reading); yet, there were spatially distributed patterns of brain activity that differentiate English and Spanish in regions of bilateral cerebellum/left OTC, the left superior occipital gyrus, the left IFC, and the left medial frontal gyrus. Overall, we found no evidence for differences in local activation or functional connectivity during English versus Spanish word processing in regions known to be involved in reading, yet we found brain-based evidence that Spanish-English bilinguals distinguish between the two languages.

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双语成人英语和西班牙语单词阅读的 fMRI 研究

阅读依赖于左侧大脑系统，包括枕颞 (OTC)、颞顶叶和下额叶 (IFC) 皮质。神经影像学研究调查了这些皮质中的激活是否受语言的正字法深度（字素到音素转换的一致性）的调节。在西班牙语-英语双语者中，一些但并非全部研究报告了两种语言在阅读过程中的激活差异。在这里，我们研究了居住在美国的早期西班牙语-英语双语成年人（N = 25；17 名女性，8 名男性）。我们检查了英语和西班牙语单词阅读过程中的本地活动、功能连接和空间分布的活动模式。我们发现左侧 IFC 中两种语言的本地活动重叠，但它们之间的激活没有差异，功能连接也几乎没有差异（都不是已知参与阅读的成对区域）；然而，在双侧小脑/左侧 OTC、左侧枕上回、左侧 IFC 和左侧额内侧回的区域中，存在区分英语和西班牙语的大脑活动的空间分布模式。总体而言，我们没有发现在已知参与阅读的区域中英语和西班牙语文字处理过程中局部激活或功能连接存在差异的证据，但我们发现基于大脑的证据表明西班牙语-英语双语者可以区分这两种语言。在双侧小脑/左侧 OTC、左侧枕上回、左侧 IFC 和左侧额内侧回的区域中，存在区分英语和西班牙语的大脑活动的空间分布模式。总体而言，我们没有发现在已知参与阅读的区域中英语和西班牙语文字处理过程中局部激活或功能连接存在差异的证据，但我们发现基于大脑的证据表明西班牙语-英语双语者可以区分这两种语言。在双侧小脑/左侧 OTC、左侧枕上回、左侧 IFC 和左侧额内侧回的区域中，存在区分英语和西班牙语的大脑活动的空间分布模式。总体而言，我们没有发现在已知参与阅读的区域中英语和西班牙语文字处理过程中局部激活或功能连接存在差异的证据，但我们发现基于大脑的证据表明西班牙语-英语双语者可以区分这两种语言。