Departmental Papers (Psychology)
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of this Version
2-2006
Publication Source
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
Volume
18
Issue
2
Start Page
267
Last Page
277
DOI
10.1162/jocn.2006.18.2.267
Abstract
A number of theories about the evolution of language posit a close (and perhaps causal) relationship between tool use and speech. Consistent with this idea, neuroimaging studies have found that tool knowledge retrieval activates not only a region of the left premotor cortex involved in hand action, but also an adjacent region that is typically described as a language center. We examined whether this pattern of activation is best described as the result of a single process, related to both action and language, or the result of two independent processes. We identified two distinct neural components that jointly contribute to this response: a posterior region centered in the premotor cortex, which responds to motor knowledge retrieval, and an anterior region centered in the left frontal operculum, which responds to lexical competition. Crucial to the interpretation of the premotor response, individual variation in motor experience was highly correlated with the magnitude of the response in the premotor cortex, but not in the prefrontal cortex.
Copyright/Permission Statement
This article was originally published in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience (http://www.mitpressjournals.org/forthcoming/jocn). This version is made available under authorization of MIT Press.
Recommended Citation
Kan, I., Kable, J. W., Van Scoyoc, A., Chatterjee, A., & Thompson-Schill, S. L. (2006). Fractionating the Left Frontal Response to Tools: Dissociable Effects of Motor Experience and Lexical Competition. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 18 (2), 267-277. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/jocn.2006.18.2.267
Date Posted: 06 December 2017
This document has been peer reviewed.