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The Functional Organization of Brain for Reading and Reading Disability (Dyslexia

Department of Pediatrics, Department of Neurology

Sally E. Shaywitz

Department of Pediatrics

Kenneth R. Pugh

Department of Pediatrics, Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Pawel Skudlarski

Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Robert K. Fulbright

Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

R.Todd Constable

Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Jack M. Fletcher

Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, University of Texas Medical School-Houston

Alvin M. Liberman

Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Donald P. Shankweiler

Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Leonard Katz

Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Richard A. Bronen

Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

Karen E. Marchione

Department of Pediatrics

Cheryl Lacadie

Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine

John C. Gore

Haskins Laboratories, Department of Diagnostic Radiology (PS, RKF, RTC, RAB, CL, JCG); Yale Umversity School of Medicine, Department of Applied Physics, Yale University

Converging evidence from many lines of investigation now indicates that dyslexia (reading disability) represents a disorder affecting linguistic systems in brain. Furthermore, these studies point to deficits in one particular component of the language system—phonological processing—as the most severe, robust, and consistent findings in children and adults with dyslexia (the "phonological deficit" hypothesis). Until recently, the cerebral localization of those processes related to reading have been elusive, in no small measure because as uniquely human activities, language and reading can be studied only in humans. Within the last year, it has become possible to use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to localize the component processes used in reading: orthography, phonology, and lexical-semantic processing. We found that in men phonological processing was lateralized to the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG, Broca's area); in contrast, in women performance of a phonological task produced bilateral activation of this region. These findings provide the first clear evidence of sex differences in the functional organization of the brain for language and indicate that these differences exist at the level of phonological processing. Not only do these findings support and extend a long-held hypothesis suggesting that language functions are more likely to be highly lateralized in males, but, of particular relevance to the scientific study of reading and reading disability, these data suggest that the activation of the IFG region during the performance of a rhyming task may provide a neural "signature" for phonological processing, the core cognitive component in reading and reading disability. NEUROSCIENTIST 2:245-255, 1996

Key Words: KEY WORDS Dyslexia • Reading • Reading disability • Phonological processing • fMRI • Language systems • Cerebral localization

The Neuroscientist, Vol. 2, No. 4, 245-255 (1996)
DOI: 10.1177/107385849600200413


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