| |
Abstract:
Clinical observations of distortions of production (and
perception) of prosody implicate that distinct, non-overlapping
neural circuits are responsible for distinct prosodic cues and
functions. These observations motivate a question whether similar
evidence can be found in the neurologically intact brain. Our
experiment is constructed to check the neuroanatomical basis of
the prosody generator, a functional unit in the phonological
system which integrates and controls the variation of prosodic
parameters. The experimental design was first evaluated by
analysing acoustic and behavioral data, before it was implemented
in a functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) study. fMRI
results show that relatively small, non-overlapping, distinct
perisilvian areas of both the right and the left hemisphere are
involved in the generation of prosody. We found specific activity
correlated with the focus accent, the modus marker and the affect
characterization. The localization appears to correlate best with
the size of the address frame of the prosodic cues. These results
can not be fully accommodated by any of the existing theories of
prosodic representation of speech in the human brain.
|
