A neural basis for category and modality specificity of semantic knowledge

To understand the meanings of words and objects, we need to have knowledge about these items themselves plus executive mechanisms that compute and manipulate semantic information in a task-appropriate way. The neural basis for semantic control remains controversial. Neuroimaging studies have focused on the role of the left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG), whereas neuropsychological research suggests that damage to a widely distributed network elicits impairments of semantic control. There is also debate about the relationship between semantic and executive control more widely. We used TMS in healthy human volunteers to create “virtual lesions” in structures typically damaged in patients with semantic control deficits: LIFG, left posterior middle temporal gyrus (pMTG), and intraparietal sulcus (IPS). The influence of TMS on tasks varying in semantic and nonsemantic control demands was examined for each region within this hypothesized network to gain insights into (i) their functional specialization (i.e., involvement in semantic representation, controlled retrieval, or selection) and (ii) their domain dependence (i.e., semantic or cognitive control). The results revealed that LIFG and pMTG jointly support both the controlled retrieval and selection of semantic knowledge. IPS specifically participates in semantic selection and responds to manipulations of nonsemantic control demands. These observations are consistent with a large-scale semantic control network, as predicted by lesion data, that draws on semantic-specific (LIFG and pMTG) and domain-independent executive components (IPS).

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THINGS-EEG: Human electroencephalography recordings for 1,854 concepts presented in rapid serial visual presentation streams

10.1101/2021.06.03.447008 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Tijl Grootswagers ◽

Ivy Zhou ◽

Amanda K Robinson ◽

Martin N Hebart ◽

Thomas A Carlson

Keyword(s):

Large Scale ◽

Large Body ◽

Visual Presentation ◽

Semantic Knowledge ◽

Image Databases ◽

Visual Object ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Object Knowledge ◽

Large Stimulus ◽

Stimulus Set

The neural basis of object recognition and semantic knowledge have been the focus of a large body of research but given the high dimensionality of object space, it is challenging to develop an overarching theory on how brain organises object knowledge. To help understand how the brain allows us to recognise, categorise, and represent objects and object categories, there is a growing interest in using large-scale image databases for neuroimaging experiments. Traditional image databases are based on manually selected object concepts and often single images per concept. In contrast, 'big data' stimulus sets typically consist of images that can vary significantly in quality and may be biased in content. To address this issue, recent work developed THINGS: a large stimulus set of 1,854 object concepts and 26,107 associated images. In the current paper, we present THINGS-EEG, a dataset containing human electroencephalography responses from 50 subjects to all concepts and 22,248 images in the THINGS stimulus set. The THINGS-EEG dataset provides neuroimaging recordings to a systematic collection of objects and concepts and can therefore support a wide array of research to understand visual object processing in the human brain.

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Influence of cognitive control on semantic representation

10.1101/067553 ◽

2016 ◽

Author(s):

Waitsang Keung ◽

Daniel Osherson ◽

Jonathan D. Cohen

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Control ◽

Semantic Representation ◽

Semantic Knowledge ◽

Neural Representation ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Attentional Modulation ◽

Task Instructions ◽

Similarity Relationships ◽

Context Specific ◽

The Brain

AbstractThe neural representation of an object can change depending on its context. For instance, a horse may be more similar to a bear than to a dog in terms of size, but more similar to a dog in terms of domesticity. We used behavioral measures of similarity together with representational similarity analysis and functional connectivity of fMRI data in humans to reveal how the neural representation of semantic knowledge can change to match the current goal demand. Here we present evidence that objects similar to each other in a given context are also represented more similarly in the brain and that these similarity relationships are modulated by context specific activations in frontal areas.Significance statementThe judgment of similarity between two objects can differ in different contexts. Here we report a study that tested the hypothesis that brain areas associated with task context and cognitive control modulate semantic representations of objects in a task-specific way.We first demonstrate that task instructions impact how objects are represented in the brain. We then show that the expression of these representations is correlated with activity in regions of frontal cortex widely thought to represent context, attention and control.In addition, we introduce spatial variance as a novel index of representational expression and attentional modulation. This promises to lay the groundwork for more exacting studies of the neural basis of semantics, as well as the dynamics of attentional modulation.

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Neural basis of emotion recognition deficits in first-episode major depression

Psychological Medicine ◽

10.1017/s0033291710002084 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 41 (7) ◽

pp. 1397-1405 ◽

Cited By ~ 28

Author(s):

G. A. van Wingen ◽

P. van Eijndhoven ◽

I. Tendolkar ◽

J. Buitelaar ◽

R. J. Verkes ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Emotion Recognition ◽

Inferior Frontal Gyrus ◽

Semantic Knowledge ◽

Anterior Cingulate ◽

Matching Task ◽

First Episode ◽

Healthy Individuals ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Left Inferior Frontal Gyrus ◽

Fearful Face

BackgroundDepressed individuals demonstrate a poorer ability to recognize the emotions of others, which could contribute to difficulties in interpersonal behaviour. This emotion recognition deficit appears related to the depressive state and is particularly pronounced when emotions are labelled semantically. Here, we investigated its neural basis by comparing emotion recognition processing between depressed, recovered and healthy individuals.MethodMedication-naive patients with a first major depressive episode, medication-free patients who had recovered from a first episode, and a group of matched healthy individuals participated. They were requested to identify the emotion of angry and fearful face stimuli, either by matching them to other emotional faces on a perceptual basis or by matching them to a semantic label, while their brain activity was measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging.ResultsThe depressed individuals performed worse than recovered and healthy individuals on the emotion-labelling but not the emotion-matching task. The labelling deficit was related to increased recruitment of the right amygdala, left inferior frontal gyrus and anterior cingulate cortex.ConclusionsDeficits in semantic labelling of negative emotions are related to increased activation in specific brain regions and these abnormalities are mood state-dependent. These results indicate that accessing semantic knowledge about negative information triggers increased amygdala and left inferior frontal gyrus processing, which subsequently impairs task-relevant behaviour. We propose that this may reflect the activation of negative schemas.

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Semantic Knowledge: Neural Basis of

International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences ◽

10.1016/b0-08-043076-7/03507-5 ◽

2001 ◽

pp. 13866-13873

Author(s):

A. Martin

Keyword(s):

Semantic Knowledge ◽

Neural Basis

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Human EEG recordings for 1,854 concepts presented in rapid serial visual presentation streams

Scientific Data ◽

10.1038/s41597-021-01102-7 ◽

2022 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Tijl Grootswagers ◽

Ivy Zhou ◽

Amanda K. Robinson ◽

Martin N. Hebart ◽

Thomas A. Carlson

Keyword(s):

Large Scale ◽

Visual Presentation ◽

Semantic Knowledge ◽

Human Vision ◽

Visual Object ◽

Neural Basis ◽

Object Knowledge ◽

Object Processing ◽

Eeg Recordings ◽

The Brain

AbstractThe neural basis of object recognition and semantic knowledge has been extensively studied but the high dimensionality of object space makes it challenging to develop overarching theories on how the brain organises object knowledge. To help understand how the brain allows us to recognise, categorise, and represent objects and object categories, there is a growing interest in using large-scale image databases for neuroimaging experiments. In the current paper, we present THINGS-EEG, a dataset containing human electroencephalography responses from 50 subjects to 1,854 object concepts and 22,248 images in the THINGS stimulus set, a manually curated and high-quality image database that was specifically designed for studying human vision. The THINGS-EEG dataset provides neuroimaging recordings to a systematic collection of objects and concepts and can therefore support a wide array of research to understand visual object processing in the human brain.

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Phonomotor Versus Semantic Feature Analysis Treatment for Anomia in 58 Persons With Aphasia: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research ◽

10.1044/2019_jslhr-l-18-0257 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 62 (12) ◽

pp. 4464-4482 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Diane L. Kendall ◽

Megan Oelke Moldestad ◽

Wesley Allen ◽

Janaki Torrence ◽

Stephen E. Nadeau

Keyword(s):

Randomized Controlled Trial ◽

Response Latency ◽

Controlled Trial ◽

Semantic Knowledge ◽

Semantic Feature ◽

Feature Analysis ◽

Group Differences ◽

Randomized Controlled ◽

Confrontation Naming ◽

Semantic Feature Analysis

Purpose The ultimate goal of anomia treatment should be to achieve gains in exemplars trained in the therapy session, as well as generalization to untrained exemplars and contexts. The purpose of this study was to test the efficacy of phonomotor treatment, a treatment focusing on enhancement of phonological sequence knowledge, against semantic feature analysis (SFA), a lexical-semantic therapy that focuses on enhancement of semantic knowledge and is well known and commonly used to treat anomia in aphasia. Method In a between-groups randomized controlled trial, 58 persons with aphasia characterized by anomia and phonological dysfunction were randomized to receive 56–60 hr of intensively delivered treatment over 6 weeks with testing pretreatment, posttreatment, and 3 months posttreatment termination. Results There was no significant between-groups difference on the primary outcome measure (untrained nouns phonologically and semantically unrelated to each treatment) at 3 months posttreatment. Significant within-group immediately posttreatment acquisition effects for confrontation naming and response latency were observed for both groups. Treatment-specific generalization effects for confrontation naming were observed for both groups immediately and 3 months posttreatment; a significant decrease in response latency was observed at both time points for the SFA group only. Finally, significant within-group differences on the Comprehensive Aphasia Test–Disability Questionnaire ( Swinburn, Porter, & Howard, 2004 ) were observed both immediately and 3 months posttreatment for the SFA group, and significant within-group differences on the Functional Outcome Questionnaire ( Glueckauf et al., 2003 ) were found for both treatment groups 3 months posttreatment. Discussion Our results are consistent with those of prior studies that have shown that SFA treatment and phonomotor treatment generalize to untrained words that share features (semantic or phonological sequence, respectively) with the training set. However, they show that there is no significant generalization to untrained words that do not share semantic features or phonological sequence features.

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