Many ERP studies have highlighted processing difficulty for animacy violation in language, more so than non-violated sentences. However, all of these findings were for non-figurative language, and studies have rarely looked at the figurative language, such as metaphors involving animacy violation, which could be integrated to make novel and acceptable meaning. The present study aimed at assessing the

Language can influence cognition in domains as varied as temporal processing, spatial categorization, and color perception (Casasanto & Boroditsky, 2008; Levinson & Wilkins, 2006; Winawer et al., 2007). Here, we provide converging behavioral and neural evidence that bilingual experience can change semantic associations. In Experiment 1, Spanish- and English-speaking bilinguals rated semantically unrelated

In the present study, we explored the underlying mechanisms of lexical retrieval in two languages when modulated by phonological context. To do so, we investigated the performance of bilingual patients with aphasia and healthy bilingual individuals on a blocked cyclic naming task as a measure of lexical activation and phonological encoding within their two languages. Highly proficient Catalan-Spanish

The present study aimed to explore the bilingual disadvantage in the course of speech production by comparing the naming performance and the temporal dynamics of object naming in three groups of participants: monolinguals, L1 bilinguals and L2 bilinguals. To determine the origin of the bilingual disadvantage, whether lexical or post-lexical, we manipulated the lexical frequency of the picture names

We examine the distinction between animacy, a conceptual property, and agency, a conceptual and linguistic property involved in semantic role assignment. Are these two notions—agency and animacy—interchangeable in the mind/brain of the comprehender or are they distinct yet correlated? If the latter, does brain behavior show sensitivity to this distinction? Through a self-paced reading and an fMRI experiment

A recent approach to explaining the domain-general cognitive outcomes of bilingualism is to consider the role of disengagement of attention, rather than the engagement of focused attention or inhibition as is typical in most accounts. The present study pursues this approach by examining the neurophysiological changes associated with disengagement of attention in young adults performing an inhibition

A growing body of research shows that the brain adapts functionally and structurally to specific bilingual experiences. These brain adaptations seem related to modulations in cognitive processes (specifically the executive functions). However, the trajectory of these adaptations is varied and seems at least partially dependent on different aspects of language exposure and use. Here we provide a review

Difficulties in phonological processing and speech perception are associated with developmental dyslexia, but there is considerable diversity across people with developmental dyslexia (e.g., dyslexics with and without phonological difficulties). Phonological and morphological awareness are both known to play an important role in reading acquisition. Problems in morpho-phonological information processing

Cognitive control is the ability to adapt flexibly to current demands by promoting task-relevant information in the face of interference, and this has been asserted as an advantage with bilinguals. Bilingual language control and general-purpose cognitive control are discussed in the literature using different types of stimuli, cognitive tasks, component processes (selection, interference, inhibition

Background Understanding the pattern of non-linguistic abilities in aphasia has been a controversial question. We hypothesized that only some aphasia patients, particularly patients with fluent forms of aphasia and global aphasia, would present deficits in non-linguistic abilities. Methods & procedures We studied 200 vascular aphasia patients (119 men and 81 women; mean age = 57.37 years, SD = 15.56)

Purpose This paper will examine how listeners perceive foreignness, precision, and speaker origin in the speech of a speaker with neurogenic foreign accent syndrome, as compared to an unimpaired native speaker, an unimpaired foreign speaker, and a native speaker with ataxic dysarthria. Method Listeners with and without experience in speech-language pathology rated degree of foreignness and precision

Listeners in fixed-stress languages are less sensitive in processing stress contrasts in a second language with contrastive stress (stress 'deafness'). We investigated whether native speakers of French (fixed-stress language) can acquire the ability to distinguish stress contrasts in Spanish (free-stress language). In behavioral experiments, we found that French listeners were able to improve their

This feasibility study investigated the effects of adaptive computerized cognitive training on visual-spatial working memory (VSWM), and reading performance in children with dyslexia. Children were assigned into a VSWM training group that received a 5-week (~30 h) computerized adaptive training program focusing on VSWM, or a waitlist control group. Behavioral and ERP measures of VSWM-related indices

The present study reports the findings of a 10-consecutive day neuronavigated continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) treatment over the right pars triangularis (pTr) for one individual with chronic global aphasia post-stroke. Baseline language and quality of life measures were collected twice prior to treatment, one day post-treatment, and then at two and 12-months follow up. Therapy was tolerated

Previous studies have found that the orthographic representation of alphabetic languages is hierarchically organized from the posterior to the anterior parts of the left ventral occipitotemporal area (vOT). More word-like stimuli, such as real words and pseudo-words, induced higher activation in the middle and the anterior parts of the left vOT compared to false fonts or consonant letter strings, while

Previous studies suggest that bilinguals’ lexical access is language non-selective, especially for orthographically identical translation equivalents across languages (i.e., identical cognates). The present study investigated how such words (e.g., 学校 meaning “school” in both Chinese and Japanese) are processed in the (late) Chinese - Japanese bilingual brain. Using an L2-Japanese lexical decision task

Word meanings are often suffused with sensory, motor, and affective features. For many of us, a word such as beach evokes a diverse range of pleasant associations including blue skies (visual), gritty sand (tactile), crashing waves (auditory), and the distinctive smell of sunscreen (olfactory). Aristotle argued for a hierarchy of the senses where vision and audition eclipse the lesser modalities of

There is much evidence that the bilingual lexicon is well integrated at the level of individual words. In this article, we propose that it is also integrated at the multiword phrase (MWP) level. We first review the representation of single words within and across languages. Drawing upon this framework, we review current accounts of MWP representations and supporting empirical evidence. Based on the

In context-driven word production, picture naming is faster following constrained than neutral sentential contexts (e.g., “The farmer milked the… [picture]” vs. “The child drew a… [picture]”, followed by the picture of a cow), suggesting conceptual-lexical pre-activation of the target response. Power decreases in the alpha-beta oscillatory band (8–25 Hz) are consistently found for constrained relative

This study examined how relative language proficiency and exposure influence the development of executive function (EF) in 7–12 year-old bilingual ‘returnee’ children. Returnees are children of immigrant families who were immersed in an environment where their second language (L2; English) was the majority societal language and returned to their native language (L1; Japanese) environment after the

Evidence shows that second language (L2) processing depends on the Age of Acquisition (AoA), proficiency and differences between L1 and L2 grammar. Here we focus on the influence of the latter factor on L2 processing. To this end, we tested early (AoA = 3 years) and highly proficient Spanish-Basque and Basque-Spanish bilinguals by means of Event-Related Potentials (ERPs) while processing noun morphology

Various sentences can describe the same event from different perspectives (e.g., “John kicked Mike.” and “Mike was kicked by John.”). Humans can easily verify propositional equivalence of these sentences, but the underlying brain mechanisms are unclear. The present study examined whether the perspective taking system is involved in the verification of propositional equivalence between two sentences

While switching costs in production have been explained in terms of top-down cognitive control, researchers do not agree whether switching costs in comprehension should be interpreted in the same way. Within the BIA + model, it has been claimed that the comprehension of code-switches can be explained sufficiently in terms of bottom-up activation of lexical representations. In the current electrophysiological

Parkinson's disease (PD), which involves the degeneration of dopaminergic neurons in the basal ganglia, has long been associated with motor deficits. Increasing evidence suggests that language can also be impaired, including aspects of syntactic and lexical processing. However, the exact pattern of these impairments remains somewhat unclear, for several reasons. Few studies have examined and compared

Visuospatial processing deficits are typically associated with damage to the right hemisphere. However, deficits on spatial working memory have been reported among some individuals with focal left hemisphere damage (LHD). It has been suggested that the left hemisphere may play a role in such non-verbal working memory tasks due to the use of subvocal, verbally-mediated strategies. The current study

The purpose of this study was to characterize further the nature of sentence processing deficits in acquired aphasia. Adults with aphasia and age-and education-matched adults with no brain damage completed a battery of formal cognitive-linguistic tests and an experimental sentence judgment task, which was performed alone and during focused attention and divided attention or dual-task conditions. The

In response to Hernandez and colleagues (2018), we provide commentary on the scientific reasoning that underlies Neuroemergentism. We argue that bilingual language and reading acquisition provide a means for examining and refining the neuroemergentist framework.

There has been virtual explosion of studies published in cognitive neuroscience primarily due to increased accessibility to neuroimaging methods, which has led to different approaches in interpretation. This review seeks to synthesize both developmental approaches and more recent views that consider neuroimaging. The ways in which Neuronal Recycling, Neural Reuse, and Language as Shaped by the Brain

Auditory-verbal short-term memory impairments are part and parcel of aphasia and interfere with linguistic processing. To date, the science about short-term memory impairments in aphasia has been generated and dominated by studying measures of accuracy, that is, span length. Because accuracy is expressed through speech, examining the speech-timing characteristics of persons with aphasia as they engage

Recent evidence has shown that convergence of print and speech processing across a network of primarily left-hemisphere regions of the brain is a predictor of future reading skills in children, and a marker of fluent reading ability in adults. The present study extends these findings into the domain of second-language (L2) literacy, through brain imaging data of English and Hebrew L2 learners. Participants

A comorbidity of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with reading difficulties (RD) is common in children. However, children with ADHD+RD have a different reading and executive functions (EF) profile than children with RD alone. We compared the effect of an EF-based intervention on neural circuits related to EF in children with RD and those with ADHD+RD. Functional connectivity MRI data

Some current models of aphasia emphasize a role of short-term memory in the processing of language and propose that the language impairment in aphasia involves impairment to cognitive processes that activate and maintain representations of words over the time-period needed to support single word and multiple word tasks, including verbal span tasks. This paper reports normative data from 39 people with

We investigate three potential mechanisms underlying the deficit in idiom comprehension seen in aphasia: difficulty inhibiting literal meanings, inability to recognize that a figurative interpretation is required, and difficulty processing abstract words and concepts. Unimpaired adults and PWA read high and moderate familiarity idioms either preceded or followed by a figuratively biasing context sentence

Genetic variants related to dopamine functioning (e.g., the ANKK1/TaqIa polymorphism within the DRD2 gene and the Val158Met polymorphism within the COMT gene) have previously been shown to predict cognitive flexibility and learning (e.g., Colzato et al., 2010; Stelzel et al., 2010). Additionally, researchers have found that these genetic variants may also predict second language learning (Mamiya et

Purpose To evaluate processing and comprehension of pronouns and reflexives in individuals with agrammatic (Broca's) aphasia and age-matched control participants. Specifically, we evaluate processing and comprehension patterns in terms of a specific hypothesis -- the Intervener Hypothesis - that posits that the difficulty of individuals with agrammatic (Broca's) aphasia results from similarity-based

The goal of this study was to test the predictions of the Featurally Underspecified Lexicon (FUL) theory by examining event-related potential (ERP) indices of phonological representation. Two English consonants differing in place of articulation were selected: [labial] /b/ and [coronal] /d/. It was assumed that the phonological representation of /d/ contained less distinctive feature information due

Research has shown neural changes following second language (L2) acquisition after weeks or months of instruction. But are such changes detectable even earlier than previously shown? The present study examines the electrophysiological changes underlying the earliest stages of second language vocabulary acquisition by recording event-related potentials (ERPs) within the first week of learning. Adult

There remains a gap in our knowledge base about neural representation of pitch attributes that occur between onset and offset of dynamic, curvilinear pitch contours. The aim is to evaluate how language experience shapes processing of pitch contours as reflected in the amplitude of cortical pitch-specific response components. Responses were elicited from three nonspeech, bidirectional (falling-rising)

Although writing systems affect reading at the level of word identification, one expects writing system to have minimal effects on comprehension processes. We tested this assumption by recording ERPs while native Chinese speakers read short texts for comprehension in the word-to-text integration (WTI) paradigm to compare with studies of English using this paradigm. Of interest was the ERP on a 2-character

Standardized neuropsychological tests are routinely used as diagnostic criteria in aging populations and are an important piece of evidence for the identification of clinical pathology and neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's disease. Tests include such measures as the Mini Mental Status Exam, Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System, Montreal Cognitive Assessment, and others. These tests

Bilingual language control may involve cognitive control, including inhibition and switching. These types of control have been previously associated with neural activity in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). In previous studies, the DRD2 gene, related to dopamine availability in the striatum, has been found to play a role in neural activity during cognitive control

PURPOSE Visual-world eyetracking is increasingly used to investigate online language processing in normal and language impaired listeners. Tracking changes in eye movements over time also may be useful for indexing language recovery in those with language impairments. Therefore, it is critical to determine the test-retest reliability of results obtained using this method. METHODS Unimpaired young adults

Bilingualism represents an interesting model of possible experience-dependent alterations in brain structure. The current study examines whether interhemispheric adaptations in brain structure are associated with bilingualism. Corpus callosum volume and cortical thickness asymmetry across 13 regions of interest (selected to include critical language and bilingual cognitive control areas) were measured

In the present study, we explored how Age of Acquisition (AoA) of L2 affected brain structures in bilingual individuals. Thirty-six native English speakers who were bilingual were scanned with high resolution MRI. After MRI signal intensity inhomogeneity correction, we applied both voxel-based morphometry (VBM) and surface-based morphometry (SBM) approaches to the data. VBM analysis was performed using

Young neurotypical adults engage in prediction during language comprehension (e.g., Altmann & Kamide, 1999; Staub & Clifton, 2006; Yoshida, Dickey & Sturt, 2013). The role of prediction in aphasic comprehension is less clear. Some evidence suggests that lexical prediction may be spared in aphasia (Dickey et al., 2014; Love & Webb, 1977; cf. Mack et al, 2013), and there is even indication that structural

In a masked cross-modal priming experiment with ERP recordings, spoken Japanese words were primed with words written in one of the two syllabary scripts of Japanese. An early priming effect, peaking at around 200ms after onset of the spoken word target, was seen in left lateral electrode sites for Katakana primes, and later effects were seen for both Hiragana and Katakana primes on the N400 ERP component

Object naming impairments or anomias are the most frequent symptom in aphasia, and can be caused by a variety of underlying neurocognitive mechanisms. Anomia in neurodegenerative or primary progressive aphasias (PPA) often appears to be based on taxonomic blurring of word meaning: words such as "dog" and "cat" are still recognized generically as referring to animals, but are no longer conceptually

The ability to process and identify visual words requires efficient orthographic processing of print, consisting of letters in alphabetic languages or characters in Chinese. The N170 is a robust neural marker for orthographic processes. Both genetic and environmental factors, such as home literacy, have been shown to influence orthographic processing at the behavioral level, but their relative contributions

Artificial language studies have demonstrated that learners are able to segment individual word-like units from running speech using the transitional probability information. However, this skill has rarely been examined in the context of natural languages, where stimulus parameters can be quite different. In this study, two groups of English-speaking learners were exposed to Norwegian sentences over

In recent years there has been considerable debate about the presence or absence of a bilingual advantage in tasks that involve cognitive control. Our previous work has established evidence of differences in brain activity between monolinguals and bilinguals in both word learning and in the avoidance of interference during a picture selection task. Recent models of cognitive control have highlighted

Pitch processing at cortical and subcortical stages of processing is shaped by language experience. We recently demonstrated that specific components of the cortical pitch response (CPR) index the more rapidly-changing portions of the high rising Tone 2 of Mandarin Chinese, in addition to marking pitch onset and sound offset. In this study, we examine how language experience (Mandarin vs. English)

The present case study investigated modality-specific aspects of novel word acquisition in aphasia. It was prompted by recent aphasia case studies indicating great interindividual variability in the ability to learn and maintain novel words in aphasia. Moreover, two previous case studies revealed a striking effect of input modality by showing effective word learning and re-learning via visual input

Reading and writing are cultural inventions that have become vital skills to master in modern society. Unfortunately, writing systems are not equally learnable and many individuals struggle to become proficient readers. Languages and their writing systems often have co-varying characteristics, due to both psycholinguistic and socio-cultural forces. This makes it difficult to determine the source of

BACKGROUND In contrast to nouns and verbs, the use of adjectives in agrammatic aphasia has not been systematically studied. However, because of the linguistic and psycholinguistic attributes of adjectives, some of which overlap with nouns and some with verbs, analysis of adjective production is important for testing theories of word class production deficits in agrammatism. AIMS The objective of the

Individuals with agrammatic aphasia exhibit restricted patterns of impairment of functional morphemes, however, syntactic characterization of the impairment is controversial. Previous studies have focused on functional morphology in clauses only. This study extends the empirical domain by testing functional morphemes in English nominal phrases in aphasia and comparing patients' impairment to their

ERPs are commonly elicited by semantic and syntactic violations in sentences, leading to proposals that they reflect neural activity underlying ordinary language comprehension. We examined ERPs in an auditory sentence-picture-matching task, using nonanomalous sentences that were either semantically reversible, (boy pushes girl) or irreversible, (boy eats apple). Timelocked to the end of the critical