2016 Volume 36 Issue 2 Pages 255-262
There is a general agreement in psycholinguistics that the language system has a tripartite architecture, with levels of sound, syntax and meaning as the core aspects of our language faculty. Linguistic information is processed at distinct levels from words to sentences and discourses. The left frontal regions play an im portant role in the process of constructing sentence structures by applying grammatical knowledge, that is syntactic processing. We have used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) , and shown that the left inferior frontal gyrus (L. IFG) and the left lateral premotor cortex (L. LPMC) are critically involved in syn tactic processing. Moreover, we have demonstrated that a glioma in the L. IFG or L. LPMC is sufficient to cause asyntactic comprehension. Detailed analyses of abnormal activation patterns in the patients with asyn tactic comprehension revealed three syntax-related networks. In addition, these analyses clarified that asyntactic comprehension are associated with the global reorganization of functionally distinct networks, differentially contributed to syntax-related functions. These results suggest the importance of the neural networks for syntactic processing.
