Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Language and Cognition

Language and Cognition

Language serves as a bridge between ideas and communication, influencing how individuals perceive and interact with the world. Psychologists have long debated whether language shapes thought or vice versa. This discussion gained grip with Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf in the 1940s, who proposed that language determines thought, a concept known as linguistic determinism. They suggested that the vocabulary and structure of a language influence how its speakers think and perceive reality.

Higher Mental Functions of the Brain: Language

Higher Mental Functions of the Brain: Language

Language is a system of communication that allows the expression of thoughts, ideas, and feelings. The brain processes language in both hemispheres.
Language formation and comprehension take place in the dominant hemisphere. The dominant hemisphere is responsible for understanding the meaning of spoken, written, or sign language, as well as the ability to communicate. For most people, the left hemisphere is the dominant one. The right hemisphere, then, gives tone and emotional context to the...

Perception

Perception

Perception is a fundamental psychological process that enables individuals to organize, interpret, and consciously experience sensory information. This process is crucial for understanding and interacting with the world around us. It includes both bottom-up and top-down processing, each playing a distinct role in how we perceive our environment.
Bottom-up processing begins at the sensory level, where receptors detect external environmental stimuli. These could include the tactile sensation of...

Non-Verbal Cues

Non-Verbal Cues

Non-verbal communication extends beyond gestures and facial expressions to include vocal elements known as paralanguage. Paralanguage consists of non-verbal vocal cues such as pitch, loudness, speech rate, pauses, and non-verbal vocalizations like laughter, sighs, and moans. These elements not only accompany speech but also provide critical emotional and contextual information.The Role of Paralanguage in CommunicationParalanguage adds depth to spoken language by conveying emotions and...

Factors Affecting Perception

Factors Affecting Perception

Perception is influenced by perceptual set, context, motivation, and emotion. Perceptual set, or perceptual expectancy, refers to the tendency to perceive things in a particular way, influenced by previous experiences and expectations. This phenomenon affects the interpretation of stimuli, creating a set of mental tendencies and assumptions that impact sensory perceptions of sound, taste, touch, and sight.
An illustrative example of a perceptual set is the scenario where an airline pilot told...

Language Development

Language Development

Children master language quickly and with relative ease, supported by both biological predisposition and reinforcement. B. F. Skinner (1957) proposed that language is learned through reinforcement, while Noam Chomsky (1965) argued that language acquisition mechanisms are biologically determined.
The critical period for language acquisition suggests that the ability to acquire language is at its peak early in life. As people age, this proficiency decreases. Language development begins very...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Consensus recommendations for clinical functional MRI applied to language mapping.

Aperture neuro·2026

Same author

Ecological assessment of transdiagnostic clinical symptoms in serious mental illness with daily smartphone surveys.

Translational psychiatry·2026

Same author

Sentiment Analysis of Naturalistic Speech Using Open-Weight Large Language Models.

Affective science·2026

Same author

Determining hemispheric language dominance from MEG beta-power modulations: Concordance with fMRI.

NeuroImage·2026

Same author

Intracranial EEG findings and outcomes in MRI-negative epilepsy with temporal lobe semiology and scalp EEG features.

Epilepsy & behavior : E&B·2026

Same author

Modulating Phonological Short-Term Memory in Stroke Survivors With Aphasia Using Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation.

Neurorehabilitation and neural repair·2025

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jul 10, 2026

Interaction between Phonological and Semantic Processes in Visual Word Recognition using Electrophysiology

Interaction between Phonological and Semantic Processes in Visual Word Recognition using Electrophysiology

Published on: June 29, 2021

Attentional and linguistic interactions in speech perception.

Merav Sabri¹, Jeffrey R Binder, Rutvik Desai

¹Medical College of Wisconsin, Department of Neurology, MEB 4550, 8701 Watertown Plank Rd., Milwaukee, WI 53226, USA. msabri@mcw.edu

|November 13, 2007

Summary

Attention significantly enhances auditory processing in the brain, particularly for speech. Unattended speech receives minimal processing, limiting phonetic and semantic understanding, as confirmed by fMRI studies.

More Related Videos

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language

Published on: October 13, 2018

Eye Tracking During Visually Situated Language Comprehension: Flexibility and Limitations in Uncovering Visual Context Effects

Eye Tracking During Visually Situated Language Comprehension: Flexibility and Limitations in Uncovering Visual Context Effects

Published on: November 30, 2018

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Jul 10, 2026

Interaction between Phonological and Semantic Processes in Visual Word Recognition using Electrophysiology

Interaction between Phonological and Semantic Processes in Visual Word Recognition using Electrophysiology

Published on: June 29, 2021

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language

Using Eye Movements Recorded in the Visual World Paradigm to Explore the Online Processing of Spoken Language

Published on: October 13, 2018

Eye Tracking During Visually Situated Language Comprehension: Flexibility and Limitations in Uncovering Visual Context Effects

Eye Tracking During Visually Situated Language Comprehension: Flexibility and Limitations in Uncovering Visual Context Effects

Published on: November 30, 2018

Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Cognitive Science
Auditory Perception

Background:

The precise neural mechanisms underlying how attention influences speech comprehension remain incompletely understood.
Selective attention is crucial for filtering auditory information and prioritizing relevant stimuli.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the neural correlates of auditory speech and non-speech perception under varying attentional demands using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
To determine how attention modulates the processing of different auditory stimulus types, including words, pseudowords, and spectrally rotated speech.

Main Methods:

fMRI was employed with 28 subjects performing a bimodal selective attention task involving auditory and visual stimuli.
Three conditions were tested: attending to auditory stimuli, ignoring auditory stimuli (attending to visual), and a visual-only control.
Auditory stimuli included real words, pseudowords, and spectrally rotated speech, while visual stimuli were Japanese characters.

Main Results:

Attending to the auditory channel significantly increased activation in bilateral posterior superior temporal and left inferior frontal regions, regardless of stimulus type.
Speech processing (words and pseudowords) elicited greater activation than spectrally rotated speech in the left orbitofrontal cortex and posterior right hemisphere, with significant attention interactions.
Lexicality effects (word vs. pseudoword) were observed in the left lateral prefrontal cortex, exclusively under conditions of auditory attention.

Conclusions:

Auditory speech presented in an unattended sensory channel undergoes limited processing, primarily at early perceptual levels.
Phonetic and lexical-semantic processing of unattended speech is significantly restricted, aligning with previous behavioral findings.
Attention plays a critical role in enabling higher-level speech comprehension by modulating neural activity in key auditory and language processing areas.