Early Brain Activity Sheds New Light On The Neural Basis Of Reading

A study ...showed very early interactions between the vision and language domains during reading, with the speech motor areas of the brain (inferior frontal gyrus) being active at the same time (after a seventh of a second) as the orthographic word-form is being resolved within a brain region called the fusiform gyrus. This finding challenges the conventional view of a temporally serial processing sequence for reading in which letter forms are initially decoded, interact with their phonological and semantic representations, and only then gain access to a speech code.This finding has a potentially important clinical application in relation to developmental dyslexia (affecting between 15-30 million people in the US alone) and those with acquired reading disabilities through injury or disease. A better understanding of normal reading processes could potentially help these individuals....