Journal
HUMAN BRAIN MAPPING
Volume 29, Issue 5, Pages 581-593Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1002/hbm.20422
Keywords
text comprehension; theory-of-mind; pragmatics; language interpretation; anterior temporal lobe; fronto-medial cortex; right hemisphere; metaanalysis; neuroimaging
Funding
- NIMH NIH HHS [R01 MH074457, R01 MH074457-03] Funding Source: Medline
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Language processing in context requires more than merely comprehending words and sentences. Important subprocesses are inferences for bridging successive utterances, the use of background knowledge and discourse context, and pragmatic interpretations. The functional neuroanatomy of these text comprehension processes has only recently been investigated. Although there is evidence for right-hemisphere contributions, reviews have implicated the left lateral prefrontal cortex, left temporal regions beyond Wernicke's area, and the left dorso-medial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) for text comprehension. To objectively confirm this extended language network and to evaluate the respective contribution of right hemisphere regions, meta-analyses of 23 neuroimaging studies are reported here. The analyses used replicator dynamics based on activation likelihood estimates. Independent of the baseline, the anterior temporal lobes (aTL) were active bilaterally. In addition, processing of coherent compared with incoherent text engaged the dmPFC and the posterior cingulate cortex. Right hemisphere activations were seen most notably in the analysis of contrasts testing specific subprocesses, such as metaphor comprehension. These results suggest task dependent contributions for the lateral PFC and the right hemisphere. Most importantly, they confirm the role of the aTL and the fronto-medial cortex for language processing in context.
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