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Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension
Single words and sentences referring to bodily actions activate the motor cortex. However, this semantic grounding of concrete language does not address the critical question whether the sensory–motor system contributes to the processing of abstract meaning and thought. We examined functional magnet...
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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Oxford University Press
2009
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Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2705699/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19068489 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhn217 |
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author | Boulenger, Véronique Hauk, Olaf Pulvermüller, Friedemann |
author_facet | Boulenger, Véronique Hauk, Olaf Pulvermüller, Friedemann |
author_sort | Boulenger, Véronique |
collection | PubMed |
description | Single words and sentences referring to bodily actions activate the motor cortex. However, this semantic grounding of concrete language does not address the critical question whether the sensory–motor system contributes to the processing of abstract meaning and thought. We examined functional magnetic resonance imaging activation to idioms and literal sentences including arm- and leg-related action words. A common left fronto-temporal network was engaged in sentence reading, with idioms yielding relatively stronger activity in (pre)frontal and middle temporal cortex. Crucially, somatotopic activation along the motor strip, in central and precentral cortex, was elicited by idiomatic and literal sentences, reflecting the body part reference of the words embedded in the sentences. Semantic somatotopy was most pronounced after sentence ending, thus reflecting sentence-level processing rather than that of single words. These results indicate that semantic representations grounded in the sensory–motor system play a role in the composition of sentence-level meaning, even in the case of idioms. |
format | Text |
id | pubmed-2705699 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2009 |
publisher | Oxford University Press |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-27056992009-07-06 Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension Boulenger, Véronique Hauk, Olaf Pulvermüller, Friedemann Cereb Cortex Articles Single words and sentences referring to bodily actions activate the motor cortex. However, this semantic grounding of concrete language does not address the critical question whether the sensory–motor system contributes to the processing of abstract meaning and thought. We examined functional magnetic resonance imaging activation to idioms and literal sentences including arm- and leg-related action words. A common left fronto-temporal network was engaged in sentence reading, with idioms yielding relatively stronger activity in (pre)frontal and middle temporal cortex. Crucially, somatotopic activation along the motor strip, in central and precentral cortex, was elicited by idiomatic and literal sentences, reflecting the body part reference of the words embedded in the sentences. Semantic somatotopy was most pronounced after sentence ending, thus reflecting sentence-level processing rather than that of single words. These results indicate that semantic representations grounded in the sensory–motor system play a role in the composition of sentence-level meaning, even in the case of idioms. Oxford University Press 2009-08 2008-12-09 /pmc/articles/PMC2705699/ /pubmed/19068489 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhn217 Text en Published by Oxford University Press 2008. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Articles Boulenger, Véronique Hauk, Olaf Pulvermüller, Friedemann Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension |
title | Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension |
title_full | Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension |
title_fullStr | Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension |
title_full_unstemmed | Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension |
title_short | Grasping Ideas with the Motor System: Semantic Somatotopy in Idiom Comprehension |
title_sort | grasping ideas with the motor system: semantic somatotopy in idiom comprehension |
topic | Articles |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2705699/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19068489 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhn217 |
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