Dual-route processing of complex words: New fMRI evidence from derivational suffixation

Abstract

Many behavioral models of the comprehension of suffixed words assume a dual-route mechanism in which these words are accessed sometimes from the mental lexicon as whole units and sometimes in terms of their component morphemes (such as happiϩness). In related neuropsychological work, Ullman et al. (1997) proposed a dual-route model for past tense processing, in which the lexicon (used for access to irregularly inflected forms) corresponds to declarative memory and a medial temporal/ parietal circuit, and the rule system (used for computation of regularly inflected forms) corresponds to procedural memory and a frontal (including Broca's area)/basal ganglia circuit. We used functional MRI and a memory encoding task to test this model for derivationally suffixed words, comparing those words that show evidence of decompositional processing in behavioral studies (-ness, -less, and -able words) with derived words that do not show decomposition effects (-ity and -ation words). By examining Broca's area and the basal ganglia as regions of interest, we found that "decomposable" derived and inflected words showed increases in activity relative to nondecomposable suffixed words. Results support a dual-route model of lexical access of complex words that is consistent with the Ullman et al. proposal.

Computational principles of working memory in sentence comprehension

“…In our model, this grammatical knowledge is encoded in procedural form [22], consistent with recent cognitive neuroscience models that map grammar onto procedural memory systems in the brain [26,27]. However, the model does not claim that words trigger the retrievals of other words via lexical associations.…”

How Linearity and Structural Complexity Interact and Affect the Recognition of Italian Derived Words

“…A full review of this literature is beyond the scope of this paper, but these factors include (a) the semantic and phonological transparency of affixed forms (Bertram et al 2000b;Bozic et al 2013;Gold and Rastle 2007); (b) a change of the grammatical category (Marslen-Wilson et al 1996;Meinzer et al 2009;Vannest et al 2005); (c) stem and surface frequency (Niswander et al 2000;Taft 1979;Taft and Ardasinski 2006;Vannest et al 2011); (d) language typology (Assink et al 2000;Boudelaa et al 2009;Bozic et al 2013); (e) configurational properties of affixes (Di Sciullo 1997;Kuperman et al 2008;Tsapkini et al 2004); (f) category information of the stem Hudson and Buijs 1995;Kuperman et al 2008); (g) word internal structure (Hudson and Buijs 1995;Kuperman et al 2009;Meinzer et al 2009); and (h) linearity, i.e., the temporal order of information, specifically, the presentation order of morphemes (Cutler et al 1985;Hudson and Buijs 1995;Kuperman et al 2008Kuperman et al , 2009. Among the aforementioned studies, proponents of multi-dimensional theories and others have investigated many of these and other factors simultaneously in the same study due to their flexible conceptualization of the word recognition process (Baayen et al 2007;Dasgupta et al 2015;Fruchter and Marantz 2015;Kuperman et al 2008Kuperman et al , 2009Kuperman et al , 2010.…”

The role of the striatum in sentence processing: Evidence from a priming study in early stages of Huntington's disease

“…Yet, investigations of healthy adults, by means of functional brain imaging, have not clarified the picture either. They showed striatal activation with tasks that were drawn from various language domains including phonology (Tettamanti et al, 2005), word morphology (Vannest, Polk, & Lewis, 2005) and syntax (e.g., Moro et al, 2001). Indeed, this functionally unspecified picture has led to two competing views.…”