Neural Correlates of Semantic for Actions: Convergent Evidence from Neuropsychological, Intracranial and Electrophysiological Measures.

JUAN FELIPE CARDONA; AMORUSO, LUCÍA; OSCAR GERSHANIK; ESTEBAN HURTADO; FACUNDO MANES; MIGUEL ANGEL ALVAREZ GONZALEZ; AGUSTÍN IBÁÑEZ

Encuentro; 3rd Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Neuroscience (SfSN); 2012

Converging neuroscientific evidence suggests that the mechanisms involved in the perception and comprehension of meaningful actions may be similar to those associated with the processing of language information. Our findings provide neuroanatomical, behavioral and electrophysiological evidence supporting this hypothesis. At a behavioral level, we evaluated the Action Sentence Compatibility Effect (ACE) in Parkinson's disease and normal controls. The ACE can be defined as a longer reaction time in the action-sentence incompatible compared to the compatible condition. We found that patients showed a much diminished ACE relative to controls. At a neuroanatomical level, intracranial recordings in epileptic patients demonstrated simultaneous bidirectional effects in language and motor systems with modulations in frontotemporal and motor regions. Finally, we obtained an electrophysiological component associated with the processing of meaning (N400) using videos about actions as stimuli. The 3 aforementioned studies provide converging evidence about motor-language coupling during semantic processing.