Age of acquisition effects on the functional organization of language in the adult brain

Mayberry, Rachel I.; Chen, Jen‐Kai; Witcher, Pamela; Klein, Denise

doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2011.05.007

Cited by 183 publications

(162 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…These results thus suggest that ASL verbs of motion are not processed by native signers as nonlinguistic imagery-because nonsigners showed activation primarily in areas associated with general biological motion processing-but rather are processed in terms of their linguistic structure (i.e., as complex morphology), as Supalla (2, 6, 7) has argued. This finding is also consistent with evidence that both grammatical judgment ability and left IFG activation correlated with age of acquisition in congenitally deaf people who learned ASL as a first language (14). Apparently, despite their apparent iconicity, ASL verbs of motion are processed in terms of their discrete combinatorial structure, like complex words in other languages, and depend for this type of processing on the left hemisphere network that underlies spoken as well as other aspects of signed languages.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 77%

“…This includes the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) (classically called Broca's area), superior temporal sulcus (STS) and adjacent superior and middle temporal gyri, and the inferior parietal lobe (IPL) (classically called Wernicke's area) including the angular (AG) and supramarginal gyri (SMG) (4,(8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18). Likewise, narrative and discourse-level aspects of signed language depend largely on right STS regions, as they do for spoken language (17,19).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Neural systems supporting linguistic structure, linguistic experience, and symbolic communication in sign language and gesture

Newman

Supalla

Fernandez

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Sign languages used by deaf communities around the world possess the same structural and organizational properties as spoken languages: In particular, they are richly expressive and also tightly grammatically constrained. They therefore offer the opportunity to investigate the extent to which the neural organization for language is modality independent, as well as to identify ways in which modality influences this organization. The fact that sign languages share the visual-manual modality with a nonlinguistic symbolic communicative system-gesture-further allows us to investigate where the boundaries lie between language and symbolic communication more generally. In the present study, we had three goals: to investigate the neural processing of linguistic structure in American Sign Language (using verbs of motion classifier constructions, which may lie at the boundary between language and gesture); to determine whether we could dissociate the brain systems involved in deriving meaning from symbolic communication (including both language and gesture) from those specifically engaged by linguistically structured content (sign language); and to assess whether sign language experience influences the neural systems used for understanding nonlinguistic gesture. The results demonstrated that even sign language constructions that appear on the surface to be similar to gesture are processed within the left-lateralized frontal-temporal network used for spoken languages-supporting claims that these constructions are linguistically structured. Moreover, although nonsigners engage regions involved in human action perception to process communicative, symbolic gestures, signers instead engage parts of the languageprocessing network-demonstrating an influence of experience on the perception of nonlinguistic stimuli.S ign languages such as American Sign Language (ASL) are natural human languages with linguistic structure. Signed and spoken languages also largely share the same neural substrates, including left hemisphere dominance revealed by brain injury and neuroimaging. At the same time, sign languages provide a unique opportunity to explore the boundaries of what, exactly, "language" is. Speech-accompanying gesture is universal (1), yet such gestures are not language-they do not have a set of structural components or combinatorial rules and cannot be used on their own to reliably convey information. Thus, gesture and sign language are qualitatively different, yet both convey symbolic meaning via the hands. Comparing them can help identify the boundaries between language and nonlinguistic symbolic communication.Despite this apparently clear distinction between sign language and gesture, some researchers have emphasized their apparent similarities. One construction that has been a focus of contention is "classifier constructions" (also called "verbs of motion"). In ASL, a verb of motion (e.g., moving in a circle) will include a root expressing the motion event, morphemes marking the manner and direction of motion (e.g., forward o...

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 77%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural systems supporting linguistic structure, linguistic experience, and symbolic communication in sign language and gesture

Newman

Supalla

Fernandez

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…Evidencia reciente apoya la importancia de las lenguas de signos en la organización funcional del lenguaje en el cerebro (Mayberry, Chen, Witcher y Klein, 2011;Morford et al, 2011), y estudios sobre el aprendizaje sostienen que las lenguas de signos y la dactilología contribuyen a mejorar las habilidades de lectura y escritura en lectores sordos (Padden y Ramsey, 2000;Padden, 2006;Puente et al, 2006;Haptonstall-Nykaza y Schick, 2007;Alvarado et al, 2008;Herrera et al, 2014). Desde esta perspectiva, las lenguas de signos tienen un impacto positivo en la lectura, no solo en el inicio de la alfabetización temprana, sino también en el conocimiento más amplio del concepto.…”

Section: Reflexiones Finalesunclassified

“…Por otra parte, los estudios desde la neuropsicología refieren que los aprendices sordos son aprendices visuales y, en consecuencia, los cerebros de los sordos se organizan de manera diferente a los cerebros de los oyentes (Bavelier, Dye y Hauser, 2006;Dye, Hauser y Bavelier, 2008;Mayberry, Chen, Witcher y Klein, 2011;Morford, Wilkinson, Villwock, Piñar y Kroll, 2011). Para la mayoría de las personas sordas, el acceso al mundo de los significados se produce a través del sentido de la visión, en consecuencia, sus estrategias de comunicación y aprendizaje son predominantemente visuales.…”

Section: Introductionunclassified

Literacy Teaching and Bilingualism in Visual Learning Processes. Contributions from Deaf Epistemologies

Fernández

2014

educ.educ

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“…For DHH children both the quality and quantity of language input in early years is often limited, and this is likely to influence later cognitive and language development, including reading (Lederberg et al, 2013;Mayberry, Chen, Witcher, & Klein, 2011;Mayberry, 2007). More specifically, the early language environment influences how well DHH signing children can establish language skills that they can utilize to learn to read (Goldin-Meadow & Mayberry, 2001;Hoffmeister & Caldwell-Harris, 2014;Mayberry, 2007).…”

Section: Reading Development In Deaf and Hard-ofhearing Signing Childrenmentioning

confidence: 99%

Signs for Developing Reading : Sign Language and Reading Development in Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Children

Holmer¹

2016

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Reading development is supported by strong language skills, not least in deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) children. Regional Special Needs Schools (RSNS) in Sweden have a bilingual curriculum, that is, DHH pupils at these schools learn Swedish Sign Language and written and/or spoken Swedish. The work in the present thesis investigates reading development in DHH children who attend these schools and who are learning to read. The primary aim of the present work was to investigate whether the reading skills of DHH signing children can be improved via computerized sign language based literacy training aimed at strengthening the connections between sign language and written language. Another aim was to investigate concurrent and longitudinal associations between skills in reading, sign language, and cognition in this population. The results indicate that sign language skills support developing reading skills in RSNS pupils (Paper I and Paper IV). In particular, sign language based literacy training appears to support development of word reading (Paper IV). In addition, awareness of the sublexical structure of sign language seems to assist word reading (Paper I). Interestingly, the ability to imitate manual gestures was related to reading skills. More specifically, precision of imitation of unfamiliar signs was associated with development of word reading (Paper IV) and precision of imitation of familiar signs, i.e., vocabulary, seemed to be associated with developing reading comprehension (Paper IV). Results also suggest that working memory and Theory of Mind (ToM) are related to reading comprehension in RSNS pupils (Paper III). In addition to these findings relating to reading development, results also suggest that sign language experience enhance the establishment of representations of manual gestures (Paper II), and that progression in ToM seem to be typical, although delayed, in RSNS pupils who are learning to read (Paper III). Taken together, the associations revealed between sign language skills and reading development support the notion that sign language skills may provide a foundation for promotion of reading skills in DHH signing children. Thus, interventions that support development of sign-based representations and their manipulation and use in written language processing, may improve reading skills in this population. To account for the present findings, a model of written language processing is proposed. Working memory has a central role in integrating environmental stimuli and language-mediated representations, and thereby provides a platform for cross-modal language processing and multimodal language development. SammanfattningEn god språklig förmåga bidrar till god läsutveckling, inte minst hos döva och hörselskadade barn. Specialpedagogiska skolmyndighetens specialskolor för döva och hörselskadade (D/H) barn har en tvåspråkig läroplan som innebär att elever på dessa skolor lär sig både svenskt teckenspråk och skriven och/eller talad svenska. De fyra arbeten som ingår i avhandlingen undersöker l...

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Age of acquisition effects on the functional organization of language in the adult brain

Cited by 183 publications

References 57 publications

Neural systems supporting linguistic structure, linguistic experience, and symbolic communication in sign language and gesture

Neural systems supporting linguistic structure, linguistic experience, and symbolic communication in sign language and gesture

Literacy Teaching and Bilingualism in Visual Learning Processes. Contributions from Deaf Epistemologies

Signs for Developing Reading : Sign Language and Reading Development in Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Children

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