Reading ability and brain function: a simple statistical model

Maxwell, A. E.; Fenwick, Peter; Fenton, George W.; Dollimore, Jonathan

doi:10.1017/s0033291700042963

Cited by 32 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 5 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…This interpretation could account for the increased incidence ofleft and mixed handers in clinic samples and others identified as having a specific problem of speech or reading (Ingram, 1959;Naidoo, 1972;Orton, 1937), and could also account for the absence of reading delays in left and mixed handers in the general population (Clark, 1970). It would be consistent with the absence of a verbal factor in the cognitive test performance of poor readers (Maxwell et al, 1974). For the rs--genotype, the reading problem was expected to arise because, as Brain (1945) put it, the child is without normal hemisphere dominance on either side.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 78%

Lateral Preference and Skill in Dyslexics: Implications of the Right Shift Theory

Annett

Kilshaw

1984

Child Psychology Psychiatry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The lateral preferences and L-R skill of 109 male and 20 female dyslexics were as expected if the distribution of lateral asymmetry is shifted less far to the right in dyslexics than in controls. Several aspects of the data were consistent with Annett's hypothesis that some dyslexics lack the left hemisphere speech-organising factor postulated by the right shift theory of handedness and that this would be sufficient to account for the proportion of affected relatives. Some dyslexics were strongly dextral and these differed from the less dextral cases in several ways which resembled the distinction between backward and retarded readers.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 78%

Lateral Preference and Skill in Dyslexics: Implications of the Right Shift Theory

Annett

Kilshaw

1984

Child Psychology Psychiatry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…A number of recent findings suggest that individual differences in cognitive abilities are characterized, in part, by differences in neural efficiency, measured by the amount of brain activation underpinning a given task (e.g., Carpenter, Just, & Reichle, 2000; Haier et al, 1988; Maxwell, Fenwick, Fenton, & Dollimore, 1974; Prat & Just, under revision; Prat, Keller, & Just, 2007). In general, among healthy participants who can perform a task, higher cognitive abilities are indexed by less (more focal distribution or lower intensity) brain activation (see Neubauer & Fink, 2009 for a review).…”

Section: Individual Differences In Neural Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Much of the research on individual differences in comprehension ability has reported increased efficiency in better readers (Maxwell et al, 1974; Prat & Just, under revision; Prat, et al, 2007). Constraints on inference processes may arise, therefore, because less-skilled readers are utilizing more resources for basic comprehension processes, leaving fewer resources available for optional or elaborative processes.…”

Section: Individual Differences In Neural Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual differences in the neural basis of causal inferencing

2011

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This study used fMRI to examine individual differences in the neural basis of causal inferencing. Participants with varying language skill levels, as indexed by scores on the vocabulary portion of the Nelson-Denny Reading Test, read four types of two-sentence passages in which causal relatedness (moderate and distant) and presence or absence of explicit clause connectives were orthogonally varied to manipulate coherence and cohesion during inference generation. Skilled readers showed better neural efficiency (less activation) during all context sentences and during all inference conditions. Increased activation in less-skilled readers was most extensively distributed in the right hemisphere (RH) homologues of left hemisphere (LH) language areas, especially in the most difficult passage types. Skilled readers also showed greater sensitivity to coherence (greater activation and synchronization in moderately related than distantly related passages) whereas less-skilled readers showed sensitivity to cohesion (greater activation and synchronization when clause connectives were present than when they were not). These finding support the hypothesis that skilled reading comprehension requires recruitment of the RH on an “as needed” basis. We describe the dynamic spillover hypothesis, a new theoretical framework that outlines the conditions under which RH language contributions are most likely evoked.

show abstract

“…Maxwell, Fenwick, Fenton, and Dollimore (1974) were among the first to link cognitive abilities with neural efficiency. In an electrophysiological exploration of good and poor readers, they found evidence that good readers had more efficient neural processes (as indexed by lower power spectra in electroencephalogram) than did poor readers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual Differences in Sentence Comprehension: A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Investigation of Syntactic and Lexical Processing Demands

Prat¹,

Keller²,

Just³

2007

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience

105

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Language comprehension is neurally underpinned by a network of collaborating cortical processing centers; individual differences in comprehension must be related to some set of this network's properties. This study investigated the neural bases of individual differences during sentence comprehension by examining the network's response to two variations in processing demands: reading sentences containing words of high versus low lexical frequency and having simpler versus more complex syntax. In a functional magnetic resonance imaging study, readers who were independently identified as having high or low working memory capacity for language exhibited three differentiating properties of their language network, namely, neural efficiency, adaptability, and synchronization. First, greater efficiency (defined as a reduction in activation associated with improved performance) was manifested as less activation in the bilateral middle frontal and right lingual gyri in high-capacity readers. Second, increased adaptability was indexed by larger lexical frequency effects in high-capacity readers across bilateral middle frontal, bilateral inferior occipital, and right temporal regions. Third, greater synchronization was observed in high-capacity readers between left temporal and left inferior frontal, left parietal, and right occipital regions. Synchronization interacted with adaptability, such that functional connectivity remained constant or increased with increasing lexical and syntactic demands in high-capacity readers, whereas low-capacity readers either showed no reliable differentiation or a decrease in functional connectivity with increasing demands. These results are among the first to relate multiple cortical network properties to individual differences in reading capacity and suggest a more general framework for understanding the relation between neural function and individual differences in cognitive performance.

show abstract

Reading ability and brain function: a simple statistical model

Cited by 32 publications

References 5 publications

Lateral Preference and Skill in Dyslexics: Implications of the Right Shift Theory

Lateral Preference and Skill in Dyslexics: Implications of the Right Shift Theory

Individual differences in the neural basis of causal inferencing

Individual Differences in Sentence Comprehension: A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Investigation of Syntactic and Lexical Processing Demands

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About