Open AccessWho was the agent? The neural correlates of reanalysis processes during sentence comprehension
Author(s) -
Hirotani Masako,
Makuuchi Michiru,
Rüschemeyer ShirleyAnn,
Friederici Angela D.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
human brain mapping
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.005
H-Index - 191
eISSN - 1097-0193
pISSN - 1065-9471
DOI - 10.1002/hbm.21146
Subject(s) - sentence , comprehension , sentence processing , psychology , noun , syntax , meaning (existential) , linguistics , natural language processing , computer science , artificial intelligence , cognitive psychology , philosophy , psychotherapist
Sentence comprehension is a complex process. Besides identifying the meaning of each word and processing the syntactic structure of a sentence, it requires the computation of thematic information, that is, information about who did what to whom. The present fMRI study investigated the neural basis for thematic reanalysis (reanalysis of the thematic roles initially assigned to noun phrases in a sentence) and its interplay with syntactic reanalysis (reanalysis of the underlying syntactic structure originally constructed for a sentence). Thematic reanalysis recruited a network consisting of Broca's area, that is, the left pars triangularis (LPT), and the left posterior superior temporal gyrus, whereas only LPT showed greater sensitivity to syntactic reanalysis. These data provide direct evidence for a functional neuroanatomical basis for two linguistically motivated reanalysis processes during sentence comprehension. Hum Brain Mapp , 2011. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.