An Opponent Process Cerebellar Asymmetry for Regulating Word Association Priming

A consensus has emerged that the cerebellum makes important contributions to a spectrum of linguistic processes, but that the psychobiology of these contributions remains enigmatic (Mariën et al., Cerebellum 13(3):386–410, 2014). One aspect of this enigma arises from the fact that, although the language-dominant left cerebral hemisphere is connected to the right cerebellum, distinctive contributions of the left cerebellar hemisphere have been documented (Murdoch and Whelan, Folia Phoniatr Logop 59:184–9, 2007), but remain poorly understood. Here, we report that neurodisruption of the left and right cerebellar hemispheres have opposite effects on associative word priming in a lexical decision task. Reaction time was measured for decisions on whether a target letter string constituted a word (e.g. bread) or, with equal probability, a pronounceable non-word (e.g. dreab). A prime word was presented for 150 ms before the target and could either, and with equal probability, be related (e.g. BUTTER) or unrelated (TRACTOR). Associative word priming was computed as the reduction in lexical decision RT on trials with related primes. Left cerebellar hemisphere continuous theta-burst transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) decreased, and right hemisphere stimulation increased, priming. The results suggest that the cerebellum contributes to predictive sequential processing, in this case language, through an opponent process mechanism coordinated by both cerebellar hemispheres.