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Hokkaido University Collection of Scholarly and Academic Papers >
Graduate School of Humanities and Human Sciences / Faculty of Humanities and Human Sciences >
Peer-reviewed Journal Articles, etc >
Neural mechanisms involved in the comprehension of metaphoric and literal sentences : An fMRI study
| Title: | Neural mechanisms involved in the comprehension of metaphoric and literal sentences : An fMRI study |
| Authors: | Shibata, Midori Browse this author | | Abe, Jun-ichi Browse this author | | Terao, Atsushi Browse this author | | Miyamoto, Tamaki Browse this author |
| Keywords: | Metaphor comprehension | | Literal comprehension | | Japanese | | Left inferior frontal cortex | | Medial frontal cortex | | Functional magnetic resonance imaging |
| Issue Date: | 29-Aug-2007 |
| Publisher: | Elsevier B.V. |
| Journal Title: | Brain Research |
| Volume: | 1166 |
| Start Page: | 92 |
| End Page: | 102 |
| Publisher DOI: | 10.1016/j.brainres.2007.06.040 |
| PMID: | 17662699 |
| Abstract: | In this study, we investigated the neural substrate involved in the comprehension of novel metaphoric sentences by comparing the findings to those obtained with literal and anomalous sentences using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Stimuli consisted of 63 copula sentences (“An A is a B”) in Japanese with metaphorical, literal, or anomalous meanings. Thirteen normal participants read these sentences silently and responded as to whether or not they could understand the meaning of each sentence. When participants read metaphoric sentences in contrast to literal sentences, higher activation was seen in the left medial frontal cortex (MeFC: Brodmann's area (BA) 9/10), the left superior frontal cortex (SFC: BA 9), and the left inferior frontal cortex (IFC: BA 45). The opposite contrast (literal sentences in contrast to metaphoric sentences) gave higher activation in the precuneus (BA 7) and the right middle and SFC (BA 8/9). These findings suggest that metaphor comprehension is involved in specific neural mechanisms of semantic and pragmatic processing which differ from those in literal comprehension. Especially, our results suggest that activation in the left IFC reflects the semantic processing and that activation in the MeFC reflects the process of inference for metaphorical interpretation to establish semantic coherence. |
| Relation: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00068993 |
| Type: | article (author version) |
| URI: | http://hdl.handle.net/2115/30175 |
| Appears in Collections: | 文学院・文学研究院 (Graduate School of Humanities and Human Sciences / Faculty of Humanities and Human Sciences) > 雑誌発表論文等 (Peer-reviewed Journal Articles, etc)
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Submitter: 柴田 みどり
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