eprintid: 3483
rev_number: 8
eprint_status: archive
userid: 69
dir: disk0/00/00/34/83
datestamp: 2016-05-10 10:12:52
lastmod: 2017-08-04 10:18:13
status_changed: 2016-05-10 10:12:52
type: article
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Handjaras, Giacomo
creators_name: Ricciardi, Emiliano
creators_name: Leo, Andrea
creators_name: Lenci, Alessandro
creators_name: Cecchetti, Luca
creators_name: Cosottini, Mirco
creators_name: Marotta, Giovanna
creators_name: Pietrini, Pietro
creators_id: 
creators_id: emiliano.ricciardi@imtlucca.it
creators_id: 
creators_id: 
creators_id: luca.cecchetti@imtlucca.it
creators_id: 
creators_id: 
creators_id: pietro.pietrini@imtlucca.it
title: How concepts are encoded in the human brain: A modality independent, category-based cortical organization of semantic knowledge
ispublished: pub
subjects: RC0321
divisions: CSA
full_text_status: none
keywords: Semantic knowledge; Blindness; Supramodality; Category-based organization; fMRI; Multivoxel pattern analysis
abstract: Abstract How conceptual knowledge is represented in the human brain remains to be determined. To address the differential role of low-level sensory-based and high-level abstract features in semantic processing, we combined behavioral studies of linguistic production and brain activity measures by functional magnetic resonance imaging in sighted and congenitally blind individuals while they performed a property-generation task with concrete nouns from eight categories, presented through visual and/or auditory modalities. Patterns of neural activity within a large semantic cortical network that comprised parahippocampal, lateral occipital, temporo-parieto-occipital and inferior parietal cortices correlated with linguistic production and were independent both from the modality of stimulus presentation (either visual or auditory) and the (lack of) visual experience. In contrast, selected modality-dependent differences were observed only when the analysis was limited to the individual regions within the semantic cortical network. We conclude that conceptual knowledge in the human brain relies on a distributed, modality-independent cortical representation that integrates the partial category and modality specific information retained at a regional level.
date: 2016
date_type: published
publication: NeuroImage
volume: 135
publisher: Elsevier
pagerange: 232 - 242
id_number: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2016.04.063
refereed: TRUE
issn: 1053-8119
official_url: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1053811916301021
funders: Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca
projects: Italian Grant “Semantic representations in the language of the blind: linguistic and neurocognitive studies” (PRIN 2008CM9MY3)
citation:   Handjaras, Giacomo and Ricciardi, Emiliano and Leo, Andrea and Lenci, Alessandro and Cecchetti, Luca and Cosottini, Mirco and Marotta, Giovanna and Pietrini, Pietro  How concepts are encoded in the human brain: A modality independent, category-based cortical organization of semantic knowledge.  NeuroImage, 135.  232 - 242.  ISSN 1053-8119      (2016)