Hemispheric specialization for communicative processing: neuroimaging data on the role of the right hemisphere

Abstract

Neuropsychology has traditionally studied language emphasizing the exclusive control of the left hemisphere of the brain over this process. With the growing development of this area in psychology and the availability of neuroimaging techniques, a critical analysis of the traditional concept of cerebral dominance for language and of the bases of the neurobiological representations of this cognitive function is crucial. In this context, this review aims to investigate evidence brought by neuroimaging studies on the role of the right hemisphere in communicative processing in healthy individuals. Data suggest a co-activation of brain hemispheres in this processing, with an important contribution given by the right hemisphere in discursive, pragmatic-inferential, and prosodic processing

Language Abilities in Neanderthals

“…The lateralization of language processing, although not as absolute as in the traditional textbook picture (Stowe et al 2005, Fisher & Marcus 2006, Fonseca et al 2009, may yet provide clues. But the connection between lateralization of function and asymmetry of anatomy is far from clear-cut-ape brains are not symmetric either (Balzeau & Gilissen 2010)-and fossils are rarely undamaged and undistorted at the level needed for asymmetry studies, so the gross asymmetries of the brain reveal little about prehistoric language.…”