Cognitive Control of Language

Hospices Civils de Lyon23 enrolled

Overview

The cognitive control of speech is central to human social communication. Two frontal brain regions seem to have a critical role: 1) Broca's area (BA) and 2) the mid-cingulate cortex (MCC). Current rehabilitation strategy is clearly based on therapies promoting language performance. However, there is few evidence that rehabilitation strategies based on nonlinguistic aspects of brain function may enhance recovery. Such strategies may benefit from knowledge about the primary -nonlinguistic- function of the BA-MCC network. The aim of LANGUAGE is to identify this primary function. One hypothesis is that, in non-speaking primates, this network is involved in cognitive control of voluntary vocal/orofacial production. Specifically, whereas BA may be responsible for the high-level selection of orofacial and vocal responses during learning, the face motor representation within the MCC may be responsible for performance monitoring, a process inherently required in learning. LANGUAGE aims to test this hypothesis by determining in human the anatomo-functional organization of the BA-MCC network thanks to functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).

Study Type

INTERVENTIONAL

Allocation

Purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Masking

NONE

Enrollment

Conditions

Healthy

Interventions

First fMRI sessionOTHER

In this session (involving a condition specific to man and a condition that we are certain to obtain in the monkey), subjects will have to learn by trial and error during successive trials, the conditional associations between three abstract stimuli and three Manual responses (3 MRI-compatible mouse buttons).

Second fMRI sessionOTHER

In this session (involving a condition specific to man and a condition that we are almost certain to obtain in monkeys), subjects will have to learn by trial and error during successive trials, the conditional associations between three abstract stimuli and Three orofacial responses (3 movements of the mouth).

Eligibility

Sex: ALLMin age: 20 YearsMax age: 45 YearsHealthy volunteers:

Medical Language ↔ Plain English

Inclusion Criteria: * being able to provide a written consent form * having a social insurance * have a normal vision (with or without corrections) * Right-handed Exclusion Criteria: * Subjects with MRI contraindications (e.g. pacemaker, claustrophobia, metal in the body, etc…). * Subjects must be willing to be advise in case of discovery of brain abnormality. * History of known neurological or psychiatric illness * Pregnant or nursing women * Persons under guardianship, curators or any other administrative or judicial measure of deprivation of rights

Outcomes

Primary Outcomes

Behavioral data: performance in the task

Performance in the task will be assessed. If performance in the task is \<80%, subjects will be excluded in the final analysis

Time frame: 3 years

fMRI data

BOLD signal will be analyzed in relation to the events of the task. Images must be not too much distorted to allow data analysis. As such, if a subject moved too much (translation\>10mm; rotation\>5°) the corresponding data will be excluded from the analysis.