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Related Concept Videos

Language and Cognition01:27

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.
Auditory Perception01:17

Auditory Perception

The auditory system is essential for sound perception, utilizing various critical structures. When sound waves enter the outer ear, they travel through the ear canal and cause the eardrum to vibrate. These vibrations are then transmitted to the middle ear, where three tiny bones – the malleus, incus, and stapes – amplify the sound. This amplification is crucial, as it ensures that the sound vibrations are strong enough to be conveyed to the inner ear. These vibrations then reach the cochlea, a...
Components of Language01:24

Components of Language

Language, whether spoken, signed, or written, consists of specific components: lexicon and grammar. The lexicon is the vocabulary of a language, comprising its words. Grammar is the set of rules used to convey meaning through the lexicon. For example, English grammar adds “-ed” to most verbs to indicate past tense. Words are formed by combining phonemes, which are the basic sound units of a language. Different languages have different sets of phonemes (e.g., “ah” vs. “eh”). Phonemes combine to...
Perceiving Loudness, Pitch, and Location01:21

Perceiving Loudness, Pitch, and Location

The human brain perceives pitch through two primary mechanisms reflected in place theory and frequency theory. Each mechanism describes how sound waves are interpreted as specific pitches by the brain, offering insights into the intricate processes of auditory perception.
Place theory, or place coding, suggests that different pitches are heard because various sound waves activate specific locations along the cochlea's basilar membrane. The brain determines the pitch of a sound by identifying...
Higher Mental Functions of the Brain: Language01:10

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...
Hearing01:31

Hearing

When we hear a sound, our nervous system is detecting sound waves—pressure waves of mechanical energy traveling through a medium. The frequency of the wave is perceived as pitch, while the amplitude is perceived as loudness.

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 20, 2026

Dissociation of the Confounding Influences of Expectancy and Integrative Difficulty Residing in Anomalous Sentences in Event-related Potential Studies
05:22

Dissociation of the Confounding Influences of Expectancy and Integrative Difficulty Residing in Anomalous Sentences in Event-related Potential Studies

Published on: May 9, 2019

Disentangling syntax and intelligibility in auditory language comprehension.

Angela D Friederici1, Sonja A Kotz, Sophie K Scott

  • 1Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany. angelafr@cbs.mpg.de

Human Brain Mapping
|September 1, 2009
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

This study reveals distinct brain regions for speech intelligibility and syntax processing. Bilateral superior temporal sulcus (STS) handles intelligibility, while the left superior temporal gyrus (STG) and STS process syntax.

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Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Cognitive Science
  • Psycholinguistics

Background:

  • Spoken language comprehension research often isolates auditory processing (intelligibility) or higher-level language aspects (syntax).
  • Brain activation studies frequently report activity in the superior temporal gyrus (STG) and superior temporal sulcus (STS), but their specific roles remain unclear.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To disentangle the functional neuroanatomy of speech intelligibility and syntactic processing using an orthogonal fMRI design.
  • To identify distinct neural substrates for processing auditory signal clarity versus grammatical structure in spoken language.

Main Methods:

  • Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was employed to investigate brain activity.
  • An orthogonal experimental design manipulated speech intelligibility and syntactic correctness independently.
  • Region of interest (ROI) analyses focused on specific temporal and frontal brain areas.

Main Results:

  • Speech intelligibility manipulations led to bilateral mid-anterior STS activation.
  • Syntactic phrase structure violations elicited left-lateralized mid STG and posterior STS activation.
  • Interactions between intelligibility and syntax were observed in left frontal and temporal cortices, with right-hemispheric activations showing less specificity.

Conclusions:

  • The mid-to-anterior STS is associated with processing speech intelligibility.
  • The mid-to-posterior STG/STS is more sensitive to syntactic information within speech.
  • Distinct neural pathways exist for intelligibility and syntax processing in the human brain.