Dissociating neural subsystems for grammar by contrasting word order and inflection.

ABSTRACT: An important question in understanding language processing is whether there are distinct neural mechanisms for processing specific types of grammatical structure, such as syntax versus morphology, and, if so, what the basis of the specialization might be. However, this question is difficult to study: A given language typically conveys its grammatical information in one way (e.g., English marks "who did what to whom" using word order, and German uses inflectional morphology). American Sign Language permits either device, enabling a direct within-language comparison. During functional (f)MRI, native signers viewed sentences that used only word order and sentences that included inflectional morphology. The two sentence types activated an overlapping network of brain regions, but with differen

SUBMITTER: Newman AJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2867749 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature