Eighth Annual Meeting of ISBN
Date: May 6 – May 10, 2000
Place: Cannon Beach, Oregon
ABSTRACTS
SYMPOSIUM: Language research: New frontiers
Chair: Denise Klein
note: **Potential New Members
CORTICAL RESPONSE TO SPEECH AND NONSPEECH VOCAL SOUNDS
P. Belin, R. J. Zatorre, P. Lafaille, P. Ahad, B. Pike, Neuropsychology/Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montral, Quebec, Canada
The human voice contains in its acoustic structure a wealth of information on the speaker’s identity and emotional state, that all listeners are able to perceive to some extent. Although this ability plays a major role in human communication, surprisingly little is known on the neural basis of the non-linguistic aspects of voice perception. We investigated this issue using fMRI, and found that a region of the superior temporal sulcus (STS) of the human brain is both sensitive and selective to human voice. This ‘voice area’ was significantly (p<0.001) more active when normal subject listened passively to vocal sounds than to nonvocal environmental sounds. Furthermore, it responded more strongly to either speech or nonspeech vocal sounds than to control stimuli such as scrambled voices, amplitude-modulated noise, or human nonvocal sounds. The voice area showed greater sensitivity and selectivity in the right hemisphere, in good agreement with existing clinical data (Van Lancker & Canter, 1982). This finding of a cerebral region specific to processing human voice, in close parallel with the ‘face area’ of the human fusiform gyrus, adds an important new piece of information to the existing knowledge on the functional architecture of human anditory cortex. Supported by McDonnel-Pew, MRC, NSERC, FRSQ and Fondation France-Telecom
BRIDGING THE GAP BETWEEN COGNITIVE MODELS AND NEUROIMAGING DATA: A CASE STUDY OF PHONOLOGICAL PROCESSING DURING VERBAL WORKING MEMORY
Julie Fiez, Dept. Psychology, 3939 O’Hara Street, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
This talk will focus on neuroimaging studies of phonological processing. Verbal rehearsal, which is thought to play a crucial role in the maintenance of verbal information in working memory, will be used as a model system to explore the relationship between neuroimaging and cognitive psychological models of phonological processes. One point of discussion will be the overlap between cognitive psychological, neuropsychological, and neuroimaging evidence for the cognitive processes and neural substrates involved in articulatory rehearsal. A second point of discussion will be the relationship between the phonological processes and neural substrates involved in working memory versus reading.
NEURAL SYSTEMS UNDERLYING LANGUAGE AND HUMAN ACTION: EVIDENCE FROM AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE
**David P. Corina, Department of Psychology, University of Washington
Neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies have examined whether the neural representation for signed language is similar to, or differs from, the representation for spoken language. These studies have convincingly shown that left hemisphere perisylvian regions are important for both modes of language processing. Less well-understood are the reports of right hemisphere involvement that appear unique to signed language processing. This talk presents new findings from studies of PET imaging that investigate the relationships between the processing of non-linguistic human actions and signed language in deaf users of American Sign Language (ASL) and hearing individuals unfamiliar with ASL. The findings indicate that, in addition to engaging cortical regions specialized for linguistic processing, the processing of ASL relies upon cortical regions involved in the perception of human action.
CEREBRAL ACTIVITY IN LANGUAGE AREAS IN DEAF SIGN-LANGUAGE USERS
Laura Ann Petitto, Robert J. Zatorre, Kristine Gauna, E. J. Nikelski, Deanna Dostie, and Alan C. Evans. Neuropsychology/Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Using PET, we measured cerebral activity in eleven congenitally deaf signers and ten hearing controls during various language tasks in ASL or LSQ (deaf) or English (hearing). Cerebral blood flow changes were observed in regions previously shown to be language-specific: the left inferior frontal cortex when signers produced meaningful signs in a verb generation task, and the planum temporale bilaterally when they viewed signs or meaningless parts of signs. These results indicate that similar language sites are recruited for sign language as well as for spoken language, suggesting that these areas are highly modifiable, and may also have evolved unique sensitivity to aspects of the patterning of natural language.
FUNCTIONAL IMAGING STUDIES OF LANGUAGE IN PATIENTS WITH DOMINANT-HEMISPHERE BRAIN LESIONS
Denise Klein, Brenda Milner, Robert Zatorre, Regina Visca, Andre Olivier and Alexander Bastos, Neuropsychology/Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
To date we have scanned 140 patients for preoperative language mapping using positron emission tomography (PET). A subset of these patients in our series have also undergone preoperative fMRI scans, intracarotid sodium amobarbital speech testing, or intraoperative cortical stimulation-mapping, enabling us to correlate our findings with these different methods. Examination of the patterns of blood-flow on different tasks, and the delineation of anatomical landmarks from MRI in these single subjects, allow for a direct examination of the relationship between morphology and function. We attempt to formulate detailed analyses of the CBF patterns observed in these patients and to define the proximity and functional significance of these regions in relation to specific brain lesions. To this end, we have explored a number of variables: the age-of-onset and the nature of the lesion, and the location of the lesion with respect to the areas of language activation. In addition to the major theoretical interest of these issues, they are extremely important for localizing the lesion and its immediate topographical relationships, and for addressing the practical problems raised by the treatment of patients with focal brain lesions.
OPEN PAPER SESSION
(note: **Potential New Members)
PROFILING BASIC VISUAL DEFICITS IN ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE
**Sandy A. Neargarder, Department of Psychology, Bridgewater State College, Bridgewater, MA 02325 and Department of Psychology, Boston University, Boston, MA
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disorder that is known to affect the visual processing areas of the brain. One question concerns whether the two primary visual pathways, the parvocellular (P) and magnocellular (M) divisions, are differentially affected in AD. The P or “what” pathway primarily mediates color, acuity, and spatial contrast sensitivity information whereas the M or “where” pathway primarily mediates motion and depth perception information. The problem in evaluating the P and M pathways’ relative vulnerability in AD is the lack of a sample in which the same individuals are administered a series of assessments. The goal of the present project was to address this question by administering a series of vision assessments to the same group of individuals, which included 14 AD patients and 15 elderly control (EC) participants matched in age and level of education. Each participant was required to pass practice conditions associated with the various assessments to insure inclusion in the experiment. Vision assessments included measures of color, contrast, motion, and depth perception. Compared to the EC participants, the AD patients exhibited significant deficits in blue/yellow color perception, motion perception, and certain aspects of depth perception. Normal performance was observed in red/green color perception, contrast perception, and other aspects of depth perception. These deficits appear to result from visual system pathology and not to inattention, lack of motivation, or a general cognitive impairment that limits task comprehension. More specifically, this pattern of deficits suggests that the P and M pathways are both affected in AD, even at the early stages of the disease process. These deficits in basic visual processes most likely contribute to higher order deficits observed in object recognition and spatial localization, which are mediated by the temporal and parietal lobes, respectively. By establishing both individual and group profiles of performance, we can begin to identify the relative integrity of the M and P visual pathways and how they contribute to higher order visual and cognitive deficits observed in AD.
DIRECTION OF GAZE ON EARLY CORTICAL PROCESSES: EEG AND MEG FINDINGS
Margot J. Taylor, Nathalie George, CerCo-CNRS UMR 5549, Toulouse, France, and LENA CNRS UPR 640, Paris, France
Despite the intuitive importance of direction of gaze, there is limited evidence of gaze-specific sensitivity in either surface recorded or intracranial neurophysiological studies in humans. Previous studies have used full face stimuli, with direction of gaze modified within the faces. We hypothesised that if only eyes were presented, we would see direction of gaze influences on EEG and/or MEG recordings. Two studies were run in which direction of gaze was manipulated, either within faces (faces presented with eyes forward, averted or closed; the face task) or when eyes-only stimuli were presented (looking forward, averted or closed; the eye task). Various control stimuli (e.g., flowers, scrambled faces or scrambled eyes) were also presented. These two tasks were run initially recording EEG event-related potentials (ERPs) in 27 subjects, and subsequently recording magnetoencephalographic (MEG) event-related fields (ERFs) in 8 subjects. Within the tasks, stimulus categories were randomly interspersed, including occasional target stimuli (checkerboards) to which subjects made a button press. For both tasks and both EEG and MEG data, early components between 145-225ms were measured, which have been previously shown to be face-responsive (N170 for ERPs and M170 for ERFs). For the ERPs, gaze direction had no amplitudes effects on N170 in the face task, but longer latencies were found for faces with eyes closed than forward or averted. With eyes-only stimuli, N170 latency effects were more marked and borderline effects on amplitudes were seen. For the M170, direction of gaze in the face task produced only amplitude differences; faces with eyes forward or averted had larger responses. In the eye task M170 had shortest latencies for eyes left and longest for eyes closed. M170 amplitude was largest for eyes forward and smallest for eyes closed. Dipoles for the M170 were fit, and localised to the fusiform gyrus region, in the eyes forward conditions in the face and eye tasks. The residual error of the dipole fits differed with direction of gaze in the face task, and were much larger for control stimuli in both tasks. Both MEG and EEG measures showed early processing effects with manipulations of direction of gaze, but these techniques are complementary, as they showed differential sensitivity. With both, however, we found that the eyes-only stimuli showed greater effects with gaze direction.
OVERLAPPING MECHANISMS OF ATTENTION AND WORKING MEMORY
**Edward Awh; Department of Psychology; University of Oregon; Eugene, OR; USA
There is strong evidence to support a dissociation of spatial working memory from other working memory systems, but less research has been devoted towards understanding the functional subcomponents of spatial working memory. I will present an overview of several studies that explore a specific hypothesis in which covert shifts of spatial attention mediate the on-line maintenance of location-specific representations. Evidence from behavioral studies, fMRI and ERP converges on two basic findings: First, the typical effects of covert orienting–enhanced visual processing at attended relative to unattended locations–can also be observed at locations that are being held in working memory. Second, if subjects are prevented from directing attention towards memorized locations, then memory accuracy declines. These results suggest a functional role for spatial selective attention in the rehearsal of information in spatial working memory.
IMPAIRED PERCEPTION OF SPEECH STIMULI IN RATS WITH INDUCED MICROGYRIA
**Matthew Clark, CMBN, Rutgers University and Biobehavioral Sciences, University of Connecticut.
Individuals with developmental language disabilities, including specific language impairment (SLI) and dyslexia, exhibit impairments in phonological processing. It has been hypothesized that these deficits may reflect a more basic deficit in rapid auditory processing. Additionally, post mortem analyses of human dyslexic brains have revealed the presence of focal neocortical malformations such as cerebrocortical microgyria. In an initial study bridging these research domains, we found that male rats with induced microgyria were impaired in discriminating rapidly presented auditory stimuli. In order to further assess this anatomical-behavioral association, we designed an experiment to assess synthetic speech processing. Specifically, the current studies were intended to assess whether processing deficits would be seen in microgyric male rats for discrimination of the consonant-vowel (c-v) syllables /ba/ vs. /wa/ and /da/ vs. /ga/ when presented in an adapted oddball reflex modification paradigm. Results showed that microgyric subjects were significantly impaired relative to shams in the discrimination of /ba/ from /wa/. These findings further support the relationship between malformations of the cerebral cortex and deficits in rapid auditory and speech processing. The results also clearly support the continued assessment of the behavioral consequences of cerebrocortical microgyria in the adult male rat as an animal model of developmental language disabilities.
DISSOCIATING CORTICAL PROCESSING OF THE CONTENT AND THE CARRIER OF SPEECH
**Alexander A. Stevens, Department of Psychiatry, Oregon Health Sciences University, Portland, OR
Numerous studies have examined the phonological and semantic components of language process. These studies of reveal bilateral activity in frontal and temporal lobe regions, despite the fact that clinopathological studies have demonstrated substantially left hemisphere organization of language in the brain. We used fMRI to examine the phonetic and non-phonetic aspects ofspeech to determine if processing of voice characteristics are responsible for right hemisphere activity. The results of two studies suggest that there is substantial overlap in the processing of phonetic and nonphonetic components of speech in the superior temporal gyrus bilaterally. However, while there appears to be substantial lateralization of phonetic processing to left inferior frontal gyrus (Broca’s area) the right inferior and middle frontal gyri respond to nonphonetic, voice-based information. These results are considered in the context of prosodic perception and voice recognition.
HIPPOCAMPAL SPATIAL REPRESENTATIONS REQUIRE VESTIBULAR INPUT.
**R.W. Stackman, Dept of Behavioral Neuroscience, Oregon Health Sciences Univ., Portland, OR
Spatial navigation is influenced by external cues (landmarks) and internal cues generated by movement (vestibular). Two populations of hippocampal neurons represent spatial information and may support spatial navigation. Place cells exhibit location-specific firing, while head direction (HD) cells discharge with respect to the direction that the animal points its head. We examined the contribution of vestibular input to place cells, HD cells and spatial behavior. Temporary inactivation of the vestibular apparatus abolished location-specific firing of place cells and HD cell activity, without altering locomotor function. In a second study, rats with permanent vestibular lesion were trained to find water reward in one corner of a square enclosure, relative to a landmark cue card on one wall. Vestibular lesion did not impair spatial task acquisition, compared to controls. However, in the absence of the cue card, lesioned rats were impaired compared to control rats. These data suggest that vestibular information is necessary for hippocampal spatial representations and spatial behavior.
THE EFFECTS OF TEMPORAL LOBECTOMY ON PAIRED-ASSOCIATE LEARNING.
Mary Lou Smith1,2, Marla Bigel2, Sandy Grayson3 and Laurie Miller4, University of Toronto1, Hospital for Sick Children2, Toronto, Westmead Hospital3, Sydney, and Royal Prince Alfred Hospital4, Sydney
Early studies of patients with temporal lobe (TL) lesions suggested that material-specific memory impairments are found in association with side of lesion; verbal memory deficits were associated with left TL lesions and non-verbal memory deficits were associated with right TL lesions. Not all studies have confirmed this relationship, however, and recently, Jones-Gotman et al. (1997) pointed out that multiple-presentation learning paradigms are more sensitive to material-specific side-of-lesion effects than one-trial memory tasks. It has also been proposed that the hippocampal complex (HC) is specialized for the learning of association between elements that are arbitrarily related (Cohen & Eichenbaum, 1993; Squire & Zola-Morgan, 1991). Although evidence exists for the role of the left TL structures, particularly the HC, in the acquisition of arbitrary verbal associations (Saling et al., 1993), this hypothesis had not yet been tested using non-verbal/visuospatial material, in which the right HC may be implicated. In this study, we developed one verbal and two visual paired-associate learning tasks, and administered them to three groups of subjects: patients with left temporal (LT) lobectomy (n = 12), patients with right temporal (RT) lobectomy (n = 13), and normal control (NC) subjects (n = 9). The verbal task required the learning of word pairs, and the visual tasks required the learning of pairs of designs or the locations of pairs of symbols. Paired-associates were learned over 3 trials, with recall and recognition tested after a 30-minute delay. As a whole, the groups showed a significant degree of learning across the 3 trials for each task. However, in the learning phase, group differences were found only on the symbol location and word tasks, with both LT and RT groups impaired. The RT group was impaired, relative to the NC group, on delayed recall and recognition of the design associates, and the LT group was impaired on the delayed recall of the words associates. There were no significant differences between the patient groups on any task. These results provide tentative support for the hypothesis that the HC is specialized for associative learning, and fail to provide evidence for material-specific specialization of function between the left and right TL structures.
Symposium: Structure-Function Relationships in Brain Morphometry or: Does Size Matter?
Chair: Robert Zatorre
note: **Potential New Members
QUANTIFYING VARIABILITY IN THE PLANUM TEMPORALE.
Chris Westbury and Robert Zatorre, Cognitive Neuroscience, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
The effort to gather definitive evidence of systematic hemispheric asymmetries in the size of the planum temporale (PT) has been faced with difficulties in identifying, standardizing, and measuring the region of interest. In the present work an operational definition for identifying the problematic posterior border of the PT on MRI scans is proposed. An interactive voxel-painting program was used to identify and label the PT simultaneously in horizontal, sagittal, and coronal planes in MRI scans, transformed into the standardized stereotaxic space of Talairach & Tournoux (1988), from 50 normal right-handed volunteers. Both grey-matter volume and cortical surface area of the PT were measured, while controlling for individual variation in overall brain shape and volume. The labeled tissue was averaged together to produce a probability map in standardized space of the region of interest. The PT region was found to be highly variable, with no single voxel being labeled with a probability of greater than 65%. No significant hemispheric differences were observed in volume or area of the PT, but the PT was found to angle upwards more sharply on the right than on the left, as observed in many prior studies. An asymmetry in area favoring the left hemisphere is introduced, however, if the posterior border is defined using a “knife-cut” rule, which excludes tissue in the ascending aspect of the Sylvian fissure. Implications of these findindgs for functional neuroimaging of the PT are discussed.
AUDITORY CORTEX MORPHOMETRY IN THE CONGENITALLY DEAF MEASURED USING MRI.
Virginia B. Penhune, Cognitive Neuroscience, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Previous investigations in this laboratory have revealed a consistent LR asymmetry in the volume of Heschl’s gyrus, region of primary auditory cortex (PAC-r), as measured from MRI scans. This study explores possible morphological changes to this area in the congenitally deaf. We hypothesized that changes in input to PAC-r during the early stages of development might produce volume changes, and might affect the direction or magnitude of the typically observed asymmetry. Ss were 12 right-handed adults, profoundly deaf from birth and native users of sign, and 10 right-handed, hearing adults matched for linguistic proficiency and age. MRI scans were acquired on a Philips Gyroscan 1.5T using a 3D, T1-weighted whole brain acquisition resulting in a voxel size of 1mm3. MRIs were transformed into standardized stereotaxic space. PAC-r was labeled by two raters (VP, RC) using software which allow the region to be visualized in three planes of section. Grey matter and white matter volumes were obtained for each hemisphere. Preliminary results from 6 deaf and 4 hearing Ss indicate no significant reduction in the volume of PAC-r in the deaf Ss, suggesting that the underlying tissue may be functional despite the lack of auditory afferent input. In addition, both groups show the same overall pattern of PAC-r asymmetry. Analyses found no significant effects for Side, Tissue type or Group. However, 3/6 deaf and 3/4 hearing Ss showed LR total volume of PAC-r and 4/6 deaf and 3/4 hearing Ss showed LR volume of PAC-r white matter. These results are consistent with studies showing preserved function-ality of primary visual cortex in the blind. Further, in a related PET study, the same deaf Ss showed activation of auditory regions outside of PAC-r when viewing signs. In this context, the present results indicate the structural integrity of PAC-r and suggest functional plasticity of the region in the absence of auditory input.
VARIABILITY IN THE ANATOMY OF THE PLANUM TEMPORALE AND POSTERIOR ASCENDING RAMUS: DO RIGHT AND LEFT HANDERS DIFFER?
Anne L. Foundas, Tulane University School of Medicine, Department of Veterans Affairs, New Orleans, LA, USA
It is well established that anatomic asymmetries exist in the human brain within the temporoparietal cortex. Postmortem and neuroimaging studies have consistently found a predominant leftward asymmetry of the planum temporale (PT) and a rightward asymmetry of the posterior ascending ramus (PAR) of the Sylvian fissure, although these studies were often unselected for handedness. In order to determine whether left and right handers differ, volumetric MRI methodologies were utilized to study variation in the anatomy of the PT and PAR in a sample of sixty-seven healthy right and left-handed adults. The left PT was significantly larger than the right, and there was a weakly significant effect of the right PAR larger than the left. Asymmetries of the PT and PAR followed a continuum of graded asymmetries with a shift to the left in the former and a shift to the right in the latter. A leftward PT asymmetry was found in 72 percent of the sample and a rightward PAR asymmetry was found in 64 percent, similar to data reported in the literature. Eight of 67 subjects had completely “reversed” asymmetries, with a larger right PT and larger left PAR. Consistent left and mixed handers were over-represented in this group with reversed asymmetries. Writing hand did not independently predict laterality as both right and left hand writers were represented in all of the laterality groups, but differences emerged when subjects were subdivided into degree of handedness groups. Consistent left and mixed handers were more likely to have reversed planar asymmetries than consistent right handers, and mixed handers were morelikely to have reversed PAR asymmetries compared to the other two groups. Left planar size and asymmetry were the best predictors of degree of handedness with consistent right handers more likely to have a larger left PT and more prominent leftward planar asymmetries compared to consistent left handers. Right PAR size was the only variable that predicted writing hand such that a larger right PAR was more common in right-hand writers who also had a greater change in PAR size between hemispheres. When the planum and PAR measures were summed by hemisphere, right-hand writers were more likely to have a leftward asymmetry than left-hand writers. The only anatomical measure that differed by sex was the size of the left PT, which was larger in men than women. The “typical” configuration of a larger left PT and larger right PAR co-occurred in 56 percent of the sample, which was only slightly more often than predicted by chance, suggesting that this configuration may not be entirely developmentally regulated. In 93 percent of the sample, the left PT was expanded relative to the left PAR, suggesting that this configuration may be developmentally regulated and may be a critical substrate for the normal development of language. Phonological decoding was evaluated in this sample, and complex relationships were found between anatomy, hand preference, and phonological decoding ability. These findings confirm that anatomic asymmetries exist within portions of the temporal and parietal cortex with some configurations more common than others, and important but complex relationships exist between writing hand, degree of handedness, and anatomic measures. These data offer partial support for Annett’s right shift theory of hemispheric specialization and for the Geschwind-Galaburda hypotheses on cerebral laterality.
USING VOXEL-BASED MORPHOMETRY TO DETECT NORMAL AND ABNORMAL BRAIN STRUCTURE
**Kate Watkins, Cognitive Neuroscience, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Traditionally morphometric studies of human brain have relied on small samples of post-mortem data. Analysis of structural MRI scans allows these studies to be carried out in vivo, in a large number of individuals and across the life span. Further, the application of voxel-based analysis allows whole-brain statistical analyses to be performed with relatively little user-interaction, removing potential subjective biases in the determination of structural and tissue boundaries. Studies using voxel-based morphometry (VBM) have revealed anatomical correlates of developmental disorders such as autism and language impairment and structural changes related to normal development. VBM involves the following steps: 1) spatial transformation of high-resolution images to match a template; 2) classification of voxels to produce binary maps of each tissue class (e.g. grey matter); 3) smoothing of the binary maps; 4) statistical analysis on a voxel-by-voxel basis. We have used these methods to analyse the MRI scans of a family with a genetic disorder of speech and language. The results suggested that the structure of the caudate nucleus was abnormal. A functional imaging study and a region-of-interest volumetric analysis corroborated this result. More recently, we used VBM to examine the structural asymmetries of the normal brain. The analysis revealed the well-known asymmetries of the planum temporale, and frontal and occipital petalias, and some other less consistently reported asymmetries, e.g. in the caudate nucleus.
WORKS IN PROGRESS
PROSPECTIVE MOTOR CODING IN SPATIAL WORKING MEMORY
Bradley R. Postle, Dept. of Neurology, U. of Penn. Med. Cntr., Philadelphia, PA
Patients with early stages of Parkinson’s disease demonstrate selective impairment of spatial working memory (Postle et al., 1997-a, -b; Owen et al., 1997), implicating a differential contribution of frontostriatal systems to spatial working memory. Recent fMRI studies of healthy adults have extended these findings, indicating that spatial delay-period activity in the caudate nucleus is greater when it precedes a motor response than when no overt response follows the delay period, a contingent relationship not observed with nonspatial memoranda (Postle & D’Esposito, 1999-a, -b), and that caudate nucleus activity is reliably greater for ego- than allocentric spatial delayed response (Postle & D’Esposito, 1999-c). These data have prompted the hypothesis that one way that the nervous system stores spatial information for short periods of time is to calculate the motor response that would be required to acquire the target stimulus (e.g., with a reach or with an eye movement), and to maintain this prospective motor code during the delay period of the task. My talk will present preliminary null results and data from a to-be-conducted follow-up experiment that represent attempts to marshal evidence consistent with the prospective motor coding model.
A NEW TEST TO PERMIT DIRECT COMPARISON OF OBJECT AND FACE DISCRIMINATION
A. Cronin-Golomb and J.M. Donovan. Department of Psychology, Boston University, Boston MA
Behavioral and imaging studies suggest that object and face discrimination may be dissociable in inferotemporal cortex. In individuals with brain dysfunction of various etiologies, the discrimination of both objects and faces may be differentially impaired. Information on the degree of impairment in these capacities could provide insight into relative dysfunction and sparing of their associated brain regions. For several reasons, it is desirable to have analogous tests of object and face discrimination. First, current tests vary greatly in cognitive demands, and the unequal difficulty makes data comparison and interpretation problematic. Second, current tests vary in stimulus features (e.g., line drawings vs. gray-scale photographs), again making it difficult to compare performance across tests. Moreover, lower-level visual processes that are affected in many neuropsychological populations, such as contrast sensitivity, process schematic vs. gray-scale stimuli in different ways, and may also affect object discrimination in a different way than face discrimination. We are currently developing a test of object discrimination that is analogous in stimulus features, cognitive demands, and all other facets of presentation and administration to the standardized Benton Facial Recognition Test. We will present pilot data comparing the performance of young adult participants on the two tests.
This research was supported by the National Institute on Aging (1 R01 AG15361-01A2, to ACG) and a Sigma Xi Grant in Aid of Research (to JMD).
MEMORY FLASH!
Gabriel Leonard, Rhonda Amsel & Olivia Bottenheim, Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, Montreal Neurological Institute, Dept of Psychology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, CANADA
We gave a questionnaire to 600 students to determine their level of knowledge of the events surrounding the death of the Princess of Wales. A second survey at one or two years after the original event assessed autobiographical, semantic and flashbulb memory.
IMAGING THIS CENTURY
Jeri Janowsky, Depts. Neurology and Behavioral Neuroscience, Oregon Health Sciences University. Portland, OR
I will present the OHSU plans for an Advanced Imaging Research Center and get feedback on the benefits and pitfalls others have experienced doing imaging, building imaging centers and working across animal and human imaging systems and from basic to clinical research questions. The theme and planned organizational structure of the OHSU center will be presented. The research expertise currently on our campus and the research expertise to be built will be presented for critique. Suggestions for the best stepwise method to implement such a center will be solicited.
PROGRAM
Saturday, May 6
Arrival
Dinner on your own (cost not included in registration)
(To be confirmed: I believe the Hospitality Suite 149 is ours for the conference.
Feel free to get together there to schmooze, snack etc.)
Sunday, May 7
(note: **Potential New Members)
7:30-9:00am Breakfast – Hospitality Suite 149
9:15 Welcome, Announcements, Business – Haystack Room
SYMPOSIUM: Language research: New frontiers
(Denise Klein: Chair)
(Half hour talks, 10 minutes each discussion)
Overview of symposium: The field of language research is vast, and a group of speakers has been chosen to reflect this diversity. All the work presented focuses on attempts to use different methodologies to explore the brain areas involved in different aspects of language processing, from auditory perception, through to complex aspects of linguistic processing.
9:30 CORTICAL RESPONSE TO SPEECH AND NONSPEECH VOCAL SOUNDS
P. Belin, R. J. Zatorre, P. Lafaille, P. Ahad, B. Pike
10:10 BRIDGING THE GAP BETWEEN COGNITIVE MODELS AND NEUROIMAGING DATA: A CASE STUDY OF PHONOLOGICAL PROCESSING DURING VERBAL WORKING MEMORY
Julie Fiez
10:50 Coffee Break
11:00 NEURAL SYSTEMS UNDERLYING LANGUATE AND HUMAN ACTION: EVIDENCE FROM AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE .
**David Corina
Noon Lunch – Pacific Horizon Room
1:30 CEREBRAL ACTIVITY IN LANGUAGE AREAS IN DEAF SIGN-LANGUAGE USERS
Laura Ann Petitto, Robert J. Zatorre, Kristine Gauna, E. J. Nikelski, Deanna Dostie, and Alan C. Evans .
2:10 FUNCTIONAL IMAGING STUDIES OF LANGUAGE IN PATIENTS WITH DOMINANT-HEMISPHERE BRAIN LESIONS
Denise Klein, Brenda Milner, Robert Zatorre, Regina Visca, Andre Olivier and Alexander Bastos
2:50 Break
4 PM:
PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS:
Dr. George Ojemann – Haystack Room
Dr. George Ojemann is a Professor in the Department of Neurosurgery, at the University of Washington. He has been a pioneer in the electrophysiological mapping of language and other higher cortical functions in the brain as well as a pioneer in the treatment of epilepsy. As an example of his influence in the field of neuroscience, he authored or co-authored over 10 papers in 1999 in journals such as Annals of Neurology, J. Neuroscience, Neuroimage, J. Cog. Neurosci. , Clinical Neurophysiology, to name a few.
5:30 Adjourn
6:30 PM Dinner HorD’ouevres Pacific Horizon Room
7:30 Banquet Pacific Horizon Room
Monday, May 8
(note: **Potential New Members)
7:30- 9:00 Breakfast – Hospitality Suite 149
OPEN PAPER SESSION
(20 minute talks, 5 minute each discussion) Haystack Room
9:00 PROFILING BASIC VISUAL DEFICITS IN ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE
** Sandy A. Neargarder,
9:25 DIRECTION OF GAZE ON EARLY CORTICAL PROCESSES: EEG AND MEG FINDINGS
Margot J. Taylor, Nathalie George
9:50 OVERLAPPING MECHANISMS OF ATTENTION AND WORKING MEMORY
**Edward Awh
10:15 Coffee Break
10:25 IMPAIRED PERCEPTION OF SPEECH STIMULI IN RATS WITH INDUCED MICROGYRIA
**Matthew Clark
10:50 DISSOCIATING CORTICAL PROCESSING OF THE CONTENT AND THE CARRIER OF SPEECH
**Alexander A. Stevens
11:15 HIPPOCAMPAL SPATIAL REPRESENTATIONS REQUIRE VESTIBULAR INPUT
**R.W. Stackman
11:35 THE EFFECTS OF TEMPORAL LOBECTOMY ON PAIRED-ASSOCIATE LEARNING
Mary Lou Smith, Marla Bigel, Sandy Grayson and Laurie Miller.
Noon – 1pm Lunch Pacific Horizon Room
Afternoon Free (Weather permitting – hike, or bowling in Seaside)
Dinner (on your own – Cost not included in registration)
Tuesday, May 9
(note: **Potential New Members)
7:30- 9:00 Breakfast – Hospitality Suite 149
Symposium: Structure-function relationships in brain morphometry or: does size matter?
(Robert Zatorre: Chair)
(Half hour talks, 10 minutes each for discussion)
9:00 QUANTIFYING VARIABILITY IN THE PLANUM TEMPORALE
Chris Westbury and Robert Zatorre
9:40 AUDITORY CORTEX MORPHOMETRY IN THE CONGENITALLY DEAF MEASURED USING MRI
Virginia B. Penhune
10:20 Coffee Break
10:30 VARIABILITY IN THE ANATOMY OF THE PLANUM TEMPORALE AND POSTERIOR ASCENDING RAMUS: DO RIGHT AND LEFT HANDERS DIFFER?
Anne L. Foundas
11:10 USING VOXEL-BASED MORPHOLOMETRY TO DETECT NORMAL AND ABNORMAL BRAIN STRUCTURE
**Kate Watkins
GENERAL DISCUSSION
12:00 Lunch (on your own, not included in registration)
2 – 3:00 Business Meeting (Coffee Available)
WORKS IN PROGRESS
3:00 PROSPECTIVE MOTOR CODING IN SPATIAL WORKING MEMORY
Bradley R. Postle
3:20 A NEW TEST TO PERMIT DIRECT COMPARISON OF OBJECT AND FACE DISCRIMINATION
A. Cronin-Golomb and J.M. Donovan
3:40 MEMORY FLASH
Gabriel Leonard, Rhonda Amsel & Olivia Bottenheim
4:00 IMAGING THIS CENTURY
Jeri Janowsky
Dinner (on your own, Cost not included in registration)