Neurobiology of Language最新文献

{"title":"Disorders of the Basal Ganglia and Cerebellum: A Comprehensive Review of Speech Sensorimotor Symptoms and Responses to Feedback Perturbations.","authors":"Hantao Wang, Ludo Max","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.291","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.291","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Situated within critical cortical-subcortical sensorimotor circuits, the basal ganglia and cerebellum are thought to play important roles in both feedforward and feedback mechanisms of speech sensorimotor control. Motor speech impairments and speech-related sensory deficits are indeed common in disorders involving these two structures such as Parkinson's disease, dystonia, and cerebellar degeneration. Recently, several studies have also investigated the impact of these disorders on the feedforward and feedback components of speech sensorimotor control by examining immediate compensation to unexpected auditory perturbations (auditory-motor compensation) and across-trials adaptation to predictable auditory perturbations (auditory-motor adaptation). Additional studies have investigated how the speech of patients with these disorders is affected by pharmacological interventions and deep brain stimulation of neural substrates related to the basal ganglia or cerebellum. This review summarizes and integrates the growing body of literature based on these three lines of inquiry regarding speech sensorimotor control in basal ganglia and cerebellar disorders: (a) motor and sensory impairments, (b) auditory-motor compensation and adaptation, and (c) effects of pharmacological and deep brain stimulation interventions on symptoms and on auditory-motor compensation/adaptation. The review highlights areas of consistency and inconsistency in the obtained results, demonstrates an apparent dissociation between impact on the phonatory versus articulatory subsystems, and identifies several critical gaps in our knowledge to date. Taken together, these insights call for further studies on speech sensorimotor control in patients with basal ganglia and cerebellar disorders, in particular studies using more rigorous experimental controls as well as innovative neuroimaging and neurostimulation techniques.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-09-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13612844/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149064838","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Neural Coding of Multiple Linguistic Components During Reading Comprehension Across Development.","authors":"Jie Chen, Xiaoxia Feng, Jia Zhang, Chan Tang, Linyan Liu, Siyi Fan, Ningxin Zhao, Yang Lei, Xiujie Yang, Xiangzhi Meng, Guosheng Ding","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.286","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.286","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Understanding how multiple linguistic components are represented within the human language network, and how these representations change across development, remains an important open question. This study examines whether the language network integrates linguistic components through regions dedicated to single components (single-component coding) or through regions representing combined components (combination-based coding), and how these representational patterns differ across development. We recruited 64 participants (34 children and 30 adults) to complete a hierarchical reading task involving pseudowords, words, sentences, and stories, enabling assessment of neural substrates for individual language components (semantics, syntax, situation model) and their combinations. Based on this task structure, we constructed seven cognitive models targeting individual components and their combinations. Model-based multivariate regression revealed overlapping engagement of left frontal and temporal regions across all models in both groups, indicating multifunctional regions supporting combination-based coding. Compared to children, adults showed more spatially focal model correspondence within core language regions. Moreover, clustering based on model-fitting performance identified three functional clusters with marked developmental differences, broadly corresponding to right frontotemporal regions (Cluster 1), left anterior frontotemporal regions (Cluster 2), and left posterior frontotemporal regions (Cluster 3). Further statistical analyses showed that adults exhibited stronger Combination Code representations in Cluster 2, whereas children relied more on Single Code representations in Cluster 3, suggesting a developmental shift toward integrated coding in anterior networks. Together, these findings reveal that the language network supports combination-based coding through functionally organized clusters, and that the representational roles of anterior and posterior regions undergo reorganization from childhood to adulthood.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-09-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13612845/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149064873","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Theta and Gamma Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (tACS) Modulate Mandarin Consonant and Lexical Tone Perception.","authors":"Yaxuan Wang, Keke Yu, Shuqi Yin, Baishen Liang, Ruiming Wang","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.285","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.285","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>A theta/gamma neural activity mechanism has been postulated to explain the auditory sampling of hierarchical syllable-phoneme structure with corresponding speech rates or linguistic hierarchies (theta for syllable and gamma for phoneme). Yet, whether such a mechanism is generalizable to Mandarin Chinese, a tonal language, where lexical tones are at syllable length but function as phonemic cues, is unclear. In this study, we applied transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) with theta or gamma currents over bilateral temporal areas in healthy Mandarin-speaking participants during a consonant or tone identification task in quiet or noisy environments. Results showed that theta tACS impaired both consonant and tone identification in quiet and prolonged reaction times across tasks and environments. Moreover, it reduced the psychometric slope for consonant identification in quiet, indicating decreased perceptual sensitivity and less distinct category boundaries. Gamma tACS, however, only delayed tone identification in quiet. Besides, both theta and gamma tACS modulated perceptual decision-making parameters in quiet, leading to increased boundary thresholds (cautiousness of decision) and altered response biases in the perceptual decision of both consonants and tones, as evidenced by the hierarchical drift-diffusion model. These findings indicate that the perception of Mandarin consonants and lexical tones is causally supported by syllable-length theta activity, presumably reflecting syllable-level holistic representations, regardless of environment. Gamma activity, however, is presumably engaged in supporting fast-changing and fine-grained acoustic features in a modulatory manner. Theoretical explanations from historical linguistics and implications for clinical or educational applications are also provided.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-09-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13612842/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149064901","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Neural and Behavioral Predictors of Speech Motor Sequence Learning in Primary Progressive Aphasia.","authors":"Hilary E Miller, Michael Brickhouse, Daisy Hochberg, Alfonso Nieto-Castanon, Jason Tourville, Bradford C Dickerson, Frank H Guenther","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.281","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.281","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This study investigated the clinical and neural correlates of speech motor sequence learning in primary progressive aphasia (PPA) to test specific predictions regarding the roles of the left posterior inferior frontal sulcus (pIFS) and left ventral premotor cortex (vPMC). A cohort of 26 participants with PPA completed a 2-day non-native consonant cluster learning paradigm. Participants also completed a battery of clinical speech-language assessments, including tests of phonological and motor programming ability, and T1-weighted structural MRI scans were obtained for a subcohort (<i>n</i> = 19) of participants. Mean cortical thickness measures were extracted using FreeSurfer software for each cortical region of interest. Separate statistical analyses were conducted to test for correlations between learning outcomes on the consonant cluster paradigm (both error rate and duration) with (1) clinical measures and (2) cortical thickness. Both analyses indicated a dissociation between correlates of error rate and duration: Duration was more strongly associated with sensorimotor cortex (including the left vPMC) and clinical motor speech measures, while error rate was primarily associated with phonological working memory correlates (including the left pIFS) and clinical repetition measures.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13612843/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149064865","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Left-Right Asymmetry in Predicting Brain Activity From LLMs' Representations Emerges With Their Formal Linguistic Competence.","authors":"Laurent Bonnasse-Gahot, Christophe Pallier","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.284","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.284","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>When humans and large language models (LLMs) process the same text, activations in the LLMs correlate with brain activity measured, e.g., using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Moreover, it has been shown that, as the training of an LLM progresses, the performance in predicting brain activity from its internal activations improves more in the left hemisphere than in the right one. The aim of the present work is to understand which kind of competence acquired by the LLMs underlies the emergence of this left-right asymmetry. Using the OLMo-2 7B language model at various training checkpoints and fMRI data from English participants, we compare the evolution of the left-right asymmetry in the correlation between brain activity and model predictions alongside performance on several benchmarks. We observe that the asymmetry co-emerges with the formal linguistic abilities of the LLM. These abilities are demonstrated in two ways: by the model's capacity to assign a higher probability to an acceptable sentence than to a grammatically unacceptable one within a minimal contrasting pair, and by its ability to produce well-formed text. By contrast, the left-right asymmetry does not align with the performance on arithmetic or Dyck language tasks; nor with text-based tasks involving world knowledge and reasoning. We generalize these results to another family of LLMs (Pythia) and two other languages, French and Chinese. Our observations indicate that the left-right asymmetry in brain predictivity matches the progress in formal linguistic competence.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13612846/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149064905","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Neural Basis of Simple Arithmetic Processing in a Native and Second Language.","authors":"Vanessa R Cerda, Macarena Suárez-Pellicioni, Nicole Y Wicha, James R Booth","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.278","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.278","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Typically, bilinguals learn multiplication facts in their native language (L1), resulting in a performance advantage for arithmetic in L1 compared to a second language (L2). This performance advantage has been shown to be greater for individuals with lower L2 proficiency, suggesting that an individual's language background may play a role in arithmetic processing. The current study aimed to determine whether adult learners of an L2 with limited L2 proficiency engage shared or separate cortical regions to process simple arithmetic across languages. Participants verified small (2 × 3) and large (8 × 9) multiplication problems in both languages, while functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was acquired. Small problems are thought to engage verbal memory to a greater extent than less practiced, large problems. Participants verified problems faster and more accurately in their L1 than L2. fMRI data suggest that the language differences in performance were not driven by differences in recruitment of the storage of arithmetic facts, as we did not observe expected differences in the engagement of the superior and middle temporal gyri (STG/MTG) across languages. Instead, these adults differentially engaged the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) across languages, suggesting that language differences in behavior may have been driven by their ability to engage more effortful arithmetic retrieval processes in L1, but not in L2. Additionally, participants exhibited expected differences in brain activation based on problem size, where small problems engaged STG/MTG and IFG associated with verbal retrieval processes and large problems presented with correct solutions engaged quantity processes associated with parietal regions.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13612847/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149064947","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Neural Cost of Language Processing: Broader Network Recruitment in Adults With Developmental Language Disorder.","authors":"Noelle T Abbott, Linnea Beasley, Gabriel J Cler","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.277","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.277","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Developmental language disorder (DLD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by persistent difficulties in language comprehension and production, despite otherwise typical cognitive abilities. Although DLD is most commonly studied in children, it often persists into adulthood, yet little is known about the neural substrates underlying language abilities in adults with DLD. To address this gap, we examined 50 adults with (<i>n</i> = 23) and without (<i>n</i> = 27) DLD using an fMRI language localizer paradigm. Participants passively listened to intelligible and acoustically degraded speech to assess both lower-level auditory processing and higher-level language comprehension. We also administered standardized language assessments to relate behavioral performance to neural activation patterns. Results indicated that auditory processing in DLD is largely intact, as both groups showed comparable activation in bilateral auditory cortices during degraded speech. In contrast, during comprehension of intact speech, adults with DLD recruited additional domain-general regions, including bilateral midline, frontal, and parietal areas. This pattern suggests compensatory or effortful engagement of broader cognitive systems to support comprehension, even during a very simple task. Critically, participants whose activation patterns more closely resembled canonical left-lateralized language networks demonstrated stronger performance on standardized language measures, implying that diffuse network recruitment may come at a cognitive cost. Overall, these findings indicate that while adults with DLD can achieve functional language comprehension, they do so through altered neural pathways.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13597105/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149026142","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Discourse Context and Co-Speech Gestures Jointly Shape Hierarchical Prediction During the Processing of a Multimodal Narrative.","authors":"James Trujillo, Benjamin Straube, Yifei He","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.276","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.276","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Understanding one another in daily communication depends on predicting language from prior discourse context and visual signals, such as co-speech gestures. However, it remains unclear how discourse context and gestures jointly shape neural predictions during naturalistic language processing. Here, participants watched multimodal narratives with spontaneously produced gestures during fMRI scanning. Leveraging transformer-based computational modeling, we disentangled linguistic predictability from contextual informativity at the sentence level, and observed that these deconstructed measures engaged neural regions associated with predictive processing across multiple multimodal representational levels. Furthermore, greater gesture availability was associated with attenuated predictability-related responses and weaker context-related effects, revealing a push-pull synergy between gestures and context. Our findings extend hierarchical predictive processing frameworks, demonstrating that gestures and discourse jointly, rather than additively, constrain neural predictions at multiple representational scales. These results demonstrate the critical and dynamically integrated role of multimodal predictive mechanisms in everyday communication.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13597107/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149026080","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Cortical Network Activity Associated With Different Types of Word Recognition Errors by Older Adults.","authors":"Mark A Eckert, Kenneth I Vaden, Carolyn M McClaskey, Susan Teubner-Rhodes, Judy R Dubno","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.275","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.275","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Word recognition scores are useful general metrics of speech understanding but provide limited insight about why listeners exhibit difficulties with word recognition tasks. For example, older adults can have the same word recognition score but make different types of errors. Different types of misperceptions for audible speech, such as misunderstanding the final consonant or a whole word, suggest that word recognition errors reflect distinct neural failures in speech processing. Patterns of activity in central auditory and attention-related cortical networks were hypothesized to predict different types of word recognition errors. Trial-level error analyses were performed with data from two neuroimaging experiments where older adults performed word recognition in noise tasks (Data Set 1: <i>N</i> = 45, mean age = 64.71 years; Data Set 2: <i>N</i> = 40, mean age = 68.97 years). Group-level independent component analysis of fMRI data collected during these tasks identified distinct patterns of activity in auditory and cingulo-opercular networks that were associated with initial or final consonant substitution errors. In addition, complete word omission errors occurred with relatively low activity in the auditory network and elevated activity in cingulo-opercular and/or default mode networks. These findings suggest that some errors occur with more cingulo-opercular-related performance monitoring, whereas other errors occur with insufficient signal in auditory cortex and/or task disengagement that has been associated with default-mode network function. Thus, patterns of cortical activity reflect the type of word recognition error and may inform reason(s) for those errors that may not be evident in an overall word recognition score.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13597106/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149026135","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Relation of the Home Literacy Environment to White Matter Pathways Associated with Language in Children 5-8 Years Old.","authors":"Alisha B Compton, Avantika Mathur, James R Booth","doi":"10.1162/NOL.a.272","DOIUrl":"10.1162/NOL.a.272","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Prior work suggests relations between the home literacy environment (HLE) and white matter in children less than 7 years of age, but studies have not yet examined the relation of HLE to white matter pathways in older children. A study on young children investigated two dorsal tracts (arcuate fasciculus [AF] and superior longitudinal fasciculus [SLF]) and one ventral tract (inferior longitudinal fasciculus [ILF]), but not the inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF). Moreover, this study did not use a method to examine specific relations with phonological or semantic mechanisms. The present study examined the relation of HLE to these four white matter pathways in a group of children 5-6 years old (<i>N</i> = 79, <i>M</i> _age = 5.9) and a group of children 7-8 years old (<i>N</i> = 107, <i>M</i> _age = 7.6). Participants completed diffusion weighted imaging scans and standardized assessments of phonology and semantics. Preregistered node-wise regression analyses tested relations of HLE to fractional anisotropy (FA). Relations were examined across 100 nodes and in the 30 nodes most associated with phonological awareness in the left AF and left SLF or semantic knowledge in the left IFOF and left ILF. Results only suggest a relation of parent-to-child reading and FA in the left IFOF for the group of children 5-6 years old. We suggest this relation may be related to the importance of picture naming in early shared reading of books. Given the limited relations demonstrated in the current preregistered study with relatively large samples, coupled with inconsistent findings in the literature, future research is needed to investigate robust relations of HLE to white matter.</p>","PeriodicalId":34845,"journal":{"name":"Neurobiology of Language","volume":"7 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13506227/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148819535","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}