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Abstract:
We investigated the relative role of the left versus right
temporal lobe in the comprehension of American Sign Language (ASL).
Nineteen deaf signers with unilateral brain lesions (11 LHD, 8 RHD)
performed two tasks, a single sign comprehension task and a
sentence-level comprehension task involving simple one-step
commands. Performance was examined in relation to two factors:
whether the lesion was in the right or left hemisphere and whether
the temporal lobe was involved or not. The group with left temporal
lobe involvement was significantly impaired on both single sign and
sentence comprehension tests (79 and 63% correct respectively),
whereas each of the other three groups performed at better than 95%
correct on both tests. We conclude that the left but not right
temporal lobe is critical in the comprehension of single signs and
simple ASL sentences.
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