Pub Date : 2026-01-21DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.010
Ena Sukunda , Katharina Faust , Hasan Korkmaz , Sajjad Muhammad , Effrosyni Ntemou
This case report investigates the cortical and subcortical representations of verbal and sign language in a bilingual patient who uses both spoken and signed modalities, assessed intraoperatively during awake surgery. Although spoken language is regularly mapped during awake craniotomies, other language modalities are rarely reported. We performed direct electrical stimulation (DES) during both spoken and sign language tasks in peritumoral regions of the left temporoparietal lobe. The language abilities of the patient were intraoperatively assessed using verbal object naming and sign recognition. Our findings demonstrate that cortical regions, such as the supramarginal gyrus, play a crucial role for both verbal and sign language. However, the specific sites within this region that elicit DES-positive responses differ between the two language modalities. Similarly, subcortical disconnections highlight the overlap between sign and verbal language, particularly in major language pathways, while also emphasizing the specialized role of motor pathways in sign language processing. Clinically, our results emphasize the importance of tailoring DES protocols for intraoperative mapping to individual patient needs, and theoretically, they enhance our understanding of the roles of the supramarginal gyrus and the corticospinal tract in language comprehension.
{"title":"Mapping the neural substrates of verbal and sign language: A single-case study using direct electrical stimulation","authors":"Ena Sukunda , Katharina Faust , Hasan Korkmaz , Sajjad Muhammad , Effrosyni Ntemou","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.010","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.010","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This case report investigates the cortical and subcortical representations of verbal and sign language in a bilingual patient who uses both spoken and signed modalities, assessed intraoperatively during awake surgery. Although spoken language is regularly mapped during awake craniotomies, other language modalities are rarely reported. We performed direct electrical stimulation (DES) during both spoken and sign language tasks in peritumoral regions of the left temporoparietal lobe. The language abilities of the patient were intraoperatively assessed using verbal object naming and sign recognition. Our findings demonstrate that cortical regions, such as the supramarginal gyrus, play a crucial role for both verbal and sign language. However, the specific sites within this region that elicit DES-positive responses differ between the two language modalities. Similarly, subcortical disconnections highlight the overlap between sign and verbal language, particularly in major language pathways, while also emphasizing the specialized role of motor pathways in sign language processing. Clinically, our results emphasize the importance of tailoring DES protocols for intraoperative mapping to individual patient needs, and theoretically, they enhance our understanding of the roles of the supramarginal gyrus and the corticospinal tract in language comprehension.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 78-89"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146076137","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-20DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.004
Marie-Ève Desjardins , Karine Marcotte , Christophe Bedetti , Bérengère Houzé , Amélie Brisebois , Maxime Descoteaux , Alex Desautels , Simona Maria Brambati
People with aphasia (PWA) display considerable variability in naming and connected speech during language recovery. While white matter lesion-related, micro- and macro-structural characteristics in the subacute and chronic phases have been associated with these language functions, the predictive value of white matter predictors acquired in the acute phase remains largely unknown. We aimed to assess how acute features of the arcuate fasciculus (AF), inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF), inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF), uncinate fasciculus (UF), and frontal aslant tract (FAT) contribute to naming and connected speech fluency and efficiency over time. Twenty-eight PWA underwent anatomical and diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging within the first week post-stroke. Naming and connected speech (quantified using correct information units per minute, CIUs/min) were assessed across the acute (0–5 days), subacute (7–15 days), and chronic (>6 months) phases. We conducted correlation and regression analyses using demographics, acute clinical scores, and characteristics of the language-related bundles of interest. Better subacute naming was correlated with higher acute naming, smaller lesions, and lower IFOF-lesion load. Subacute connected speech was correlated positively to acute CIUs/min and negatively to IFOF-lesion load. Regression models revealed that acute naming predicted subacute naming, and a combination of acute CIUs/min and IFOF-lesion load predicted subacute CIUs/min. Acute aphasia severity, as reflected in acute naming or connected speech performances, is a key predictor of subacute outcomes. Furthermore, the contribution of acute white matter tracts appears to vary across symptoms and recovery stages.
{"title":"Longitudinal prediction of naming and connected speech in post-stroke aphasia: Contribution of acute white matter characteristics","authors":"Marie-Ève Desjardins , Karine Marcotte , Christophe Bedetti , Bérengère Houzé , Amélie Brisebois , Maxime Descoteaux , Alex Desautels , Simona Maria Brambati","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.004","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.004","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>People with aphasia (PWA) display considerable variability in naming and connected speech during language recovery. While white matter lesion-related, micro- and macro-structural characteristics in the subacute and chronic phases have been associated with these language functions, the predictive value of white matter predictors acquired in the acute phase remains largely unknown. We aimed to assess how acute features of the arcuate fasciculus (AF), inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF), inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF), uncinate fasciculus (UF), and frontal aslant tract (FAT) contribute to naming and connected speech fluency and efficiency over time. Twenty-eight PWA underwent anatomical and diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging within the first week post-stroke. Naming and connected speech (quantified using correct information units per minute, CIUs/min) were assessed across the acute (0–5 days), subacute (7–15 days), and chronic (>6 months) phases. We conducted correlation and regression analyses using demographics, acute clinical scores, and characteristics of the language-related bundles of interest. Better subacute naming was correlated with higher acute naming, smaller lesions, and lower IFOF-lesion load. Subacute connected speech was correlated positively to acute CIUs/min and negatively to IFOF-lesion load. Regression models revealed that acute naming predicted subacute naming, and a combination of acute CIUs/min and IFOF-lesion load predicted subacute CIUs/min. Acute aphasia severity, as reflected in acute naming or connected speech performances, is a key predictor of subacute outcomes. Furthermore, the contribution of acute white matter tracts appears to vary across symptoms and recovery stages.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 101-116"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146076068","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-16DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.003
Ningjing Cui , Robert J. van Beers , Jeroen B.J. Smeets , Bernadette C.M. van Wijk
Emerging evidence suggests that decision making is not a purely cognitive process preceding motor output but rather an embodied phenomenon in which the sensorimotor system actively shapes choice selection. Beta oscillations (13–30 Hz) over sensorimotor cortex are known to encode movement-related activity and have recently been shown to influence behaviour in perceptual decision-making tasks through lateralization of the post-movement rebound following response execution, biasing subsequent decisions toward the alternative response hand. This study investigated whether sensorimotor beta oscillations elicited by an isolated choice-unrelated motor action influence a subsequent perceptual decision. Twenty-nine healthy adults completed a two-stage task while 64-channel EEG was recorded. Each trial began with a left or right thumb button press, followed after a variable delay (.5, 1.2, or 3 sec) by a briefly presented visual grating requiring a decision response on its orientation via a second button press. Beta activity following the initial movement was related to subsequent decision bias at both the between-subject and the within-subject single-trial level: participants with stronger beta power lateralization during decision stimulus presentation exhibited stronger alternation bias, and stronger lateralized beta power in individual trials was associated with higher alternation probability, independent of the delay between the initial movement and the decision stimulus. These results suggest that beta activity may index individual susceptibility to decision bias, while also acting as a momentary neural signal influencing alternation behaviour. Within the framework of embodied decision-making, these findings support the influence of sensorimotor beta oscillations on the choice process.
{"title":"How prior motor states can shape perceptual decision bias: Insights from sensorimotor beta oscillations","authors":"Ningjing Cui , Robert J. van Beers , Jeroen B.J. Smeets , Bernadette C.M. van Wijk","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.003","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.003","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Emerging evidence suggests that decision making is not a purely cognitive process preceding motor output but rather an embodied phenomenon in which the sensorimotor system actively shapes choice selection. Beta oscillations (13–30 Hz) over sensorimotor cortex are known to encode movement-related activity and have recently been shown to influence behaviour in perceptual decision-making tasks through lateralization of the post-movement rebound following response execution, biasing subsequent decisions toward the alternative response hand. This study investigated whether sensorimotor beta oscillations elicited by an isolated choice-unrelated motor action influence a subsequent perceptual decision. Twenty-nine healthy adults completed a two-stage task while 64-channel EEG was recorded. Each trial began with a left or right thumb button press, followed after a variable delay (.5, 1.2, or 3 sec) by a briefly presented visual grating requiring a decision response on its orientation via a second button press. Beta activity following the initial movement was related to subsequent decision bias at both the between-subject and the within-subject single-trial level: participants with stronger beta power lateralization during decision stimulus presentation exhibited stronger alternation bias, and stronger lateralized beta power in individual trials was associated with higher alternation probability, independent of the delay between the initial movement and the decision stimulus. These results suggest that beta activity may index individual susceptibility to decision bias, while also acting as a momentary neural signal influencing alternation behaviour. Within the framework of embodied decision-making, these findings support the influence of sensorimotor beta oscillations on the choice process.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 117-136"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146112654","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-14DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.002
Bryan Madero , Matthew Sodoma , Chris Oehler , Vincent A. Magnotta , Jeffrey D. Long , Eliot Hazeltine , Michelle W. Voss
Older adults have difficulty switching between competing goals with increasing age due to declines in executive function (EF) and changes in brain network connectivity, including the Cognitive Control Network (CCN). Prior research shows that greater global functional connectivity (GFC) in the CCN supports cognitive flexibility. However, it is unclear whether CCN GFC is associated with task-switching in older adults. Task-switching performance relies on both switching and working memory. Mixing cost reflects the ability to maintain and coordinate multiple task rules in working memory and is sensitive to age-related declines in EF, whereas switching cost is more closely linked to age-related general slowing in processing speed. This study investigates how CCN GFC relates to task-switching performance in older adults using two task versions. Participants aged 55–80 years old performed the Separate and Overlap versions for behavioral analyses (n = 118). Six 8-min resting-state fMRI sessions were collected over two days for brain behavior analyses (n = 112). Whole grey-matter GFC was calculated, followed by average GFC extraction from the CCN, Default Mode Network (DMN), and Somatomotor Network (SMN). Results showed that older adults were slower and less accurate in the Overlap version. Greater CCN, DMN, and SMN GFC were associated with smaller mixing costs in the Overlap version. SMN GFC was linked to larger mixing costs and smaller switching costs in the Separate version. Our findings suggest that greater integration of the CCN, DMN, and SMN, as measured by GFC, is associated with better task-switch performance under increasing working memory demands.
{"title":"Global functional connectivity of cognitive control networks predicts task-switching performance in older adults","authors":"Bryan Madero , Matthew Sodoma , Chris Oehler , Vincent A. Magnotta , Jeffrey D. Long , Eliot Hazeltine , Michelle W. Voss","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.002","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.002","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Older adults have difficulty switching between competing goals with increasing age due to declines in executive function (EF) and changes in brain network connectivity, including the Cognitive Control Network (CCN). Prior research shows that greater global functional connectivity (GFC) in the CCN supports cognitive flexibility. However, it is unclear whether CCN GFC is associated with task-switching in older adults. Task-switching performance relies on both switching and working memory. Mixing cost reflects the ability to maintain and coordinate multiple task rules in working memory and is sensitive to age-related declines in EF, whereas switching cost is more closely linked to age-related general slowing in processing speed. This study investigates how CCN GFC relates to task-switching performance in older adults using two task versions. Participants aged 55–80 years old performed the Separate and Overlap versions for behavioral analyses (n = 118). Six 8-min resting-state fMRI sessions were collected over two days for brain behavior analyses (n = 112). Whole grey-matter GFC was calculated, followed by average GFC extraction from the CCN, Default Mode Network (DMN), and Somatomotor Network (SMN). Results showed that older adults were slower and less accurate in the Overlap version. Greater CCN, DMN, and SMN GFC were associated with smaller mixing costs in the Overlap version. SMN GFC was linked to larger mixing costs and smaller switching costs in the Separate version. Our findings suggest that greater integration of the CCN, DMN, and SMN, as measured by GFC, is associated with better task-switch performance under increasing working memory demands.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 90-100"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146076136","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-13DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.009
Kelsey L. Frewin , Ross E. Vanderwert , Chiara Gambi , Louis Renoult , Sarah A. Gerson
When do infants first begin grasping the meaning of verbs? To learn verbs – words that describe actions and events – theorists suggest that infants must employ word segmentation, event processing, and verb-to-action mapping skills. Prior research suggests that many of these skills emerge by approximately 10 months. In the current study, we examined whether 10-month-old infants understand several early verbs. In a novel action-verb pairing paradigm, infants saw videos of everyday actions while hearing matching or mismatching verbs. We tested adults on the same paradigm to verify that action-verb pairs reliably evoked an N400 mismatch effect. Adults showed an N400-like effect over frontal and centroparietal regions. Infants also showed ERP differences between mismatched and matched action-verb pairs, although the pattern differed from adults, with variation in topography and directionality. Infants’ ERP response was not related to their receptive or productive vocabulary size. These findings indicate that infants were sensitive to co-occurrences between actions and verbs, reflecting emerging verb understanding and suggesting nascent semantic knowledge. We further consider alternative explanations, including the possibility that the observed ERP differences reflect early action-verb associations that may serve as building blocks for later semantic verb knowledge. These results expand our understanding of infant language acquisition by demonstrating that, by 10 months, infants are sensitive to mismatches between everyday actions and verbs.
{"title":"Electrophysiological evidence of infants’ understanding of verbs","authors":"Kelsey L. Frewin , Ross E. Vanderwert , Chiara Gambi , Louis Renoult , Sarah A. Gerson","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.009","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.009","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>When do infants first begin grasping the meaning of verbs? To learn verbs – words that describe actions and events – theorists suggest that infants must employ word segmentation, event processing, and verb-to-action mapping skills. Prior research suggests that many of these skills emerge by approximately 10 months. In the current study, we examined whether 10-month-old infants understand several early verbs. In a novel action-verb pairing paradigm, infants saw videos of everyday actions while hearing matching or mismatching verbs. We tested adults on the same paradigm to verify that action-verb pairs reliably evoked an N400 mismatch effect. Adults showed an N400-like effect over frontal and centroparietal regions. Infants also showed ERP differences between mismatched and matched action-verb pairs, although the pattern differed from adults, with variation in topography and directionality. Infants’ ERP response was not related to their receptive or productive vocabulary size. These findings indicate that infants were sensitive to co-occurrences between actions and verbs, reflecting emerging verb understanding and suggesting nascent semantic knowledge. We further consider alternative explanations, including the possibility that the observed ERP differences reflect early action-verb associations that may serve as building blocks for later semantic verb knowledge. These results expand our understanding of infant language acquisition by demonstrating that, by 10 months, infants are sensitive to mismatches between everyday actions and verbs.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 41-60"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146076135","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-13DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.008
Ivan Patané , Mariano D'Angelo , Elisa Zamagni , Richard Moreau , Minh Tu Pham , Alice C. Roy , Francesca Frassinetti , Alessandro Farnè
The recognition of one's own body is a fundamental component of body self-representation. While several studies have reported a self-advantage (enhanced performance when processing one's own body parts), this phenomenon appears complex and inconsistently observed across tasks. In particular, a self-advantage often emerges in implicit tasks, where self-recognition is incidental, whereas explicit self-recognition tasks sometimes reveal no advantage or even a self-disadvantage. Although previous research has examined various aspects of movement self-recognition, systematic investigations directly comparing self-advantage effects in implicit versus explicit recognition of one's own movements, and disentangling the respective contributions of vision and proprioception within this framework, remain scarce. Here, we tested the hypothesis that the self-advantage effect previously reported for static body parts extends to the recognition of one's own movements, in visual and proprioceptive conditions. In the implicit task, participants judged the perceived lateral direction (left or right) of their own or others' arm reaching movements, which were pre-recorded and replayed using an upper-limb exoskeleton. In the explicit task, participants judged whether reaching movements were their own or not. In the visual condition, they observed the exoskeleton executing the reaching movements, while in the proprioceptive condition their arm was passively moved by the exoskeleton. Results showed self-advantage in the implicit recognition task, with participants demonstrating higher accuracy in discriminating their own actions in both visual and proprioceptive modalities. Notably, this self-advantage for movement ownership was also observed in the explicit recognition within the visual modality, but was absent in the proprioceptive modality. Thus, individuals can implicitly differentiate distinct proprioceptive and visual kinematic patterns associated with their own movements, this advantage extending to explicit recognition in the visual modality. These findings reveal the role of proprioceptive experience in implicitly favoring action discrimination and highlight the differential influence of visual and proprioceptive cues in motion self-recognition.
{"title":"The role of vision and proprioception in implicit and explicit self-movement recognition","authors":"Ivan Patané , Mariano D'Angelo , Elisa Zamagni , Richard Moreau , Minh Tu Pham , Alice C. Roy , Francesca Frassinetti , Alessandro Farnè","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.008","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.008","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The recognition of one's own body is a fundamental component of body self-representation. While several studies have reported a self-advantage (enhanced performance when processing one's own body parts), this phenomenon appears complex and inconsistently observed across tasks. In particular, a self-advantage often emerges in implicit tasks, where self-recognition is incidental, whereas explicit self-recognition tasks sometimes reveal no advantage or even a self-disadvantage. Although previous research has examined various aspects of movement self-recognition, systematic investigations directly comparing self-advantage effects in implicit versus explicit recognition of one's own movements, and disentangling the respective contributions of vision and proprioception within this framework, remain scarce. Here, we tested the hypothesis that the self-advantage effect previously reported for static body parts extends to the recognition of one's own movements, in visual and proprioceptive conditions. In the implicit task, participants judged the perceived lateral direction (left or right) of their own or others' arm reaching movements, which were pre-recorded and replayed using an upper-limb exoskeleton. In the explicit task, participants judged whether reaching movements were their own or not. In the visual condition, they observed the exoskeleton executing the reaching movements, while in the proprioceptive condition their arm was passively moved by the exoskeleton. Results showed self-advantage in the implicit recognition task, with participants demonstrating higher accuracy in discriminating their own actions in both visual and proprioceptive modalities. Notably, this self-advantage for movement ownership was also observed in the explicit recognition within the visual modality, but was absent in the proprioceptive modality. Thus, individuals can implicitly differentiate distinct proprioceptive and visual kinematic patterns associated with their own movements, this advantage extending to explicit recognition in the visual modality. These findings reveal the role of proprioceptive experience in implicitly favoring action discrimination and highlight the differential influence of visual and proprioceptive cues in motion self-recognition.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 61-77"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146076067","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-13DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.001
Io Salmons , Helena Muntané-Sánchez
Assessment tools for diagnosing aphasia in languages other than English are scarce, particularly for minority languages such as Catalan. The present study introduces the Catalan adaptation of the Comprehensive Aphasia Test (CAT-CAT), the first assessment tool of its kind in Catalan, which was developed with careful consideration of cultural and psycholinguistic factors. Additionally, the study provides normative data based on a sample of 110 Catalan-dominant speakers without language or speech disorders in order to establish the range of non-pathological performance and cut-off scores. We also examined the role of sociodemographic factors on language skills in multilingual speakers of a minority language, a topic often overlooked in the literature. Our findings show that subtests evaluating writing skills in Catalan-speaking individuals are less reliable than those assessing oral abilities, as many Catalan speakers have not received formal instruction in their mother tongue. This factor influences performance more than other variables, such as education level. Notably, language-mixing effects from Spanish were observed mainly in specific production subtests. These findings emphasize the need for language-specific adaptations and, therefore, the value of the CAT–CAT as a tool for both clinical and research purposes in aphasiology.
{"title":"Adaptation and normative data for the Comprehensive Aphasia Test in Catalan (CAT-CAT)","authors":"Io Salmons , Helena Muntané-Sánchez","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.001","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2026.01.001","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Assessment tools for diagnosing aphasia in languages other than English are scarce, particularly for minority languages such as Catalan. The present study introduces the Catalan adaptation of the <em>Comprehensive Aphasia Test</em> (CAT-CAT), the first assessment tool of its kind in Catalan, which was developed with careful consideration of cultural and psycholinguistic factors. Additionally, the study provides normative data based on a sample of 110 Catalan-dominant speakers without language or speech disorders in order to establish the range of non-pathological performance and cut-off scores. We also examined the role of sociodemographic factors on language skills in multilingual speakers of a minority language, a topic often overlooked in the literature. Our findings show that subtests evaluating writing skills in Catalan-speaking individuals are less reliable than those assessing oral abilities, as many Catalan speakers have not received formal instruction in their mother tongue. This factor influences performance more than other variables, such as education level. Notably, language-mixing effects from Spanish were observed mainly in specific production subtests. These findings emphasize the need for language-specific adaptations and, therefore, the value of the CAT–CAT as a tool for both clinical and research purposes in aphasiology.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 1-18"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146015800","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-08DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.007
Mariana P. Nucci , Kelly Cotosck , Katerina Lukasova , Ricardo Nitrini , Cheryl L. Grady , Edson Amaro Jr. , Jed A. Meltzer
Neuroimaging studies comparing literate and illiterate participants have revealed how left-lateralized language and vision networks come to show selectivity for processing written words. However, learning to read may also change the brain's processing of spoken language. We recruited older adults from São Paulo, Brazil, who are classified as “functionally illiterate” from a lack of formal education. They were compared with both age-matched and younger highly educated adults to discern effects of both age and education. Participants completed a word-monitoring task in which they listened to an extended narrative and responded with a button press whenever they heard a specific target word. This task was performed in the native language Portuguese and in an unknown language, Japanese, along with a low-level baseline tone-detection task. We hypothesized that illiterate participants would be unable to perform the unknown language version due to undeveloped abilities to detect and extract phonological sequences from speech, related to phonological awareness skills developed by reading. This was confirmed, with unknown-language word monitoring performance selectively correlated with functional literacy. In functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a positive age effect revealed that literate older adults (N = 21) recruited sensorimotor networks to a larger degree than younger adults equated on education (N = 23), in both languages. A positive education effect specific to the unknown language revealed that illiterate older participants (N = 15) failed to recruit the right inferior frontal gyrus, homolog to Broca's area. These results suggest that the right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG) plays a crucial role in explicit phonological analysis, an ability developed through years of formal education and literacy.
{"title":"Literacy modulates engagement of the right inferior frontal gyrus in phonological processing of spoken language","authors":"Mariana P. Nucci , Kelly Cotosck , Katerina Lukasova , Ricardo Nitrini , Cheryl L. Grady , Edson Amaro Jr. , Jed A. Meltzer","doi":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.007","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.007","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Neuroimaging studies comparing literate and illiterate participants have revealed how left-lateralized language and vision networks come to show selectivity for processing written words. However, learning to read may also change the brain's processing of spoken language. We recruited older adults from São Paulo, Brazil, who are classified as “functionally illiterate” from a lack of formal education. They were compared with both age-matched and younger highly educated adults to discern effects of both age and education. Participants completed a word-monitoring task in which they listened to an extended narrative and responded with a button press whenever they heard a specific target word. This task was performed in the native language Portuguese and in an unknown language, Japanese, along with a low-level baseline tone-detection task. We hypothesized that illiterate participants would be unable to perform the unknown language version due to undeveloped abilities to detect and extract phonological sequences from speech, related to phonological awareness skills developed by reading. This was confirmed, with unknown-language word monitoring performance selectively correlated with functional literacy. In functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a positive age effect revealed that literate older adults (N = 21) recruited sensorimotor networks to a larger degree than younger adults equated on education (N = 23), in both languages. A positive education effect specific to the unknown language revealed that illiterate older participants (N = 15) failed to recruit the right inferior frontal gyrus, homolog to Broca's area. These results suggest that the right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG) plays a crucial role in explicit phonological analysis, an ability developed through years of formal education and literacy.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":10758,"journal":{"name":"Cortex","volume":"196 ","pages":"Pages 19-40"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3,"publicationDate":"2026-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146015857","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-01-02DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2025.12.005
Belle Jacobs , Guillem Olivé , Immaculada Rico-Pons , Antoni Rodríguez-Fornells , Claudia Peñaloza
Although it is well established that discourse abilities are often impaired in people with aphasia (PWA), research and assessment methods addressing spoken discourse in Spanish-speaking PWA are limited. Moreover, the white matter underpinnings of discourse production in aphasia are understudied, calling for their comprehensive examination across both macro and micro-structural levels. The present study developed a Spanish main concept (MC) checklist for the Cookie Theft picture description task to assess discourse informativeness abilities in Spanish-speaking PWA. We used this task to evaluate discourse performance in 19 Spanish-speaking PWA relative to 37 neurotypical controls as per macro-structural and micro-structural discourse metrics. The association between discourse performance and aphasia severity as well as brain structural connectivity as per bilateral language-related white matter tract volumes and fractional anisotropy values were investigated in PWA. Our Spanish MC checklist for the Cookie Theft resulted in 7 MCs largely consistent with previous research. We found that PWA performed significantly below the neurotypical controls in most discourse metrics. Aphasia severity was associated with the number of verbs produced in picture description. The volumes of the left Arcuate Fasciculus (posterior segment) and the right Inferior Longitudinal Fasciculus were associated with micro- and macro-structural metrics of discourse performance, respectively. Our findings suggest that white matter structural connectivity in the left and the right hemisphere may differentially support linguistic and functional aspects of discourse ability in chronic aphasia.
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