Lesion‐symptom mapping of language impairments in people with brain tumours: The influence of linguistic stimuli

Abstract

People with tumours in specific brain sites might face difficulties in tasks with different linguistic material. Previous lesion-symptom mapping studies (VLSM) demonstrated that people with tumours in posterior temporal regions have more severe linguistic impairments. However, to the best of our knowledge, preoperative performance and lesion location on tasks with different linguistic stimuli have not been examined. In the present study, we performed VLSM on 52 people with left gliomas to examine whether tumour distribution differs depending on the tasks of the Aachen Aphasia Test. The VLSM analysis revealed that single-word production (e.g. object naming) was associated with the inferior parietal lobe and that compound and sentence production were additionally associated with posterior temporal gyri. Word repetition was affected in people with tumours in inferior parietal areas, whereas sentence repetition was the only task to be associated with frontal regions. Subcortically, word and sentence production were found to be affected in people with tumours reaching the arcuate fasciculus, and compound production was primarily associated with tumours affecting the inferior longitudinal and inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus. Our work shows that tasks with linguistic stimuli other than single-word naming (e.g. compound and sentence production) relate to additional cortical and subcortical brain areas. At a clinical level, we show that tasks that target the same processes (e.g. repetition) can have different neural correlates depending on

Introduction to the special issue on cognitive neurosurgery

“…Salillas et al (2023) used verb generation during magnetoencephalography and showed larger neuronal responses in the inferior frontal gyrus with a condition with multiple correct responses (e.g., for a noun like 'button' there can be more than one correct response: 'to button up' and 'to sew'). Ntemou et al (2023) performed a voxel-lesion symptom mapping study based on 52 German speakers with left hemisphere gliomas and showed that, before surgery, tasks other than single-word naming (e.g., compound and sentence production) relate to further cortico-subcortical brain areas. Burkhardt et al (2023) showed that three French-speaking people with a left anterior tumour affecting the left inferior longitudinal fasciculus had difficulties retrieving the names of famous people, particularly after tumour removal surgery.…”

“…Ntemou et al. (2023) performed a voxel‐lesion symptom mapping study based on 52 German speakers with left hemisphere gliomas and showed that, before surgery, tasks other than single‐word naming (e.g., compound and sentence production) relate to further cortico‐subcortical brain areas. Burkhardt et al.…”