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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 20, 2026

Stimulating the Lip Motor Cortex with Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation

Stimulating the Lip Motor Cortex with Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation

Published on: June 14, 2014

Sensory-motor brain network connectivity for speech comprehension.

Alessandro Londei¹, Alessandro D'Ausilio, Demis Basso

¹Department of Psychology, University of Rome Sapienza, Rome, Italy. alessandro.londei@uniroma1.it

Human Brain Mapping

|September 26, 2009

Summary

Listening to speech activates brain networks. Semantic content and speech reproducibility influence functional connectivity within language and motor areas, revealing distinct network dynamics.

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Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Cognitive Neuroscience
Functional Neuroimaging

Background:

Listening to speech engages extensive brain networks.
Understanding how the brain processes different types of auditory speech stimuli is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate brain network dynamics during passive listening to words, pseudo-words, and reversed words.
To identify how semantic content and stimulus reproducibility modulate functional connectivity.

Main Methods:

Utilized functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data.
Applied a novel data-driven technique combining independent component analysis (ICA) and Granger causality.
Analyzed functional connectivity modulations in language, parietal, somatosensory, motor, and cerebellar regions.

Main Results:

Word and pseudo-word listening showed compact connectivity within a parieto-somato-motor network and between temporal and frontal gyri.
Reversed-word listening disrupted this network, showing separate frontal and temporal-driven networks.
The right cerebellum lost functional connectivity with motor areas in the reversed-word condition.

Conclusions:

Semantic content influences the compactness of brain network dynamics and the balance between frontal and temporal language areas.
Speech material reproducibility modulates connectivity patterns within and towards somatosensory and motor areas.