Enhanced image generation abilities in deaf signers: a right hemisphere effect
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1Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience, Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
Abstract:
Deaf subjects who use American Sign Language as their primary language generated visual mental images faster than hearing nonsigning subjects when stimuli were initially presented to the right hemisphere. Deaf subjects exhibited a strong right hemisphere advantage for image generation using either categorical or coordinate spatial relations representations. In contrast, hearing subjects showed evidence of left hemisphere processing for categorical spatial relations representations, and no hemispheric asymmetry for coordinate spatial relations representations. The enhanced right hemisphere image generation abilities observed in deaf singers may be linked to a stronger right hemisphere involvement in processing imageable signs and linguistically encoded spatial relations.
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01:28Lateralization
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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...