Language dominance in neurologically normal and epilepsy subjects: a functional MRI study. Brain 1999 Nov;122 ( Pt 11):2033-46
Date
11/05/1999Pubmed ID
10545389DOI
10.1093/brain/122.11.2033Scopus ID
2-s2.0-0032721893 (requires institutional sign-in at Scopus site) 692 CitationsAbstract
Language dominance and factors that influence language lateralization were investigated in right-handed, neurologically normal subjects (n = 100) and right-handed epilepsy patients (n = 50) using functional MRI. Increases in blood oxygenation-dependent signal during a semantic language activation task relative to a non-linguistic, auditory discrimination task provided an index of language system lateralization. As expected, the majority of both groups showed left hemisphere dominance, although a continuum of activation asymmetry was evident, with nearly all subjects showing some degree of right hemisphere activation. Using a categorical dominance classification, 94% of the normal subjects were considered left hemisphere dominant and 6% had bilateral, roughly symmetric language representation. None of the normal subjects had rightward dominance. There was greater variability of language dominance in the epilepsy group, with 78% showing left hemisphere dominance, 16% showing a symmetric pattern and 6% showing right hemisphere dominance. Atypical language dominance in the epilepsy group was associated with an earlier age of brain injury and with weaker right hand dominance. Language lateralization in the normal group was weakly related to age, but was not significantly related to sex, education, task performance or familial left-handedness.
Author List
Springer JA, Binder JR, Hammeke TA, Swanson SJ, Frost JA, Bellgowan PS, Brewer CC, Perry HM, Morris GL, Mueller WMAuthors
Jeffrey R. Binder MD Professor in the Neurology department at Medical College of WisconsinWade M. Mueller MD Professor in the Neurosurgery department at Medical College of Wisconsin
Sara J. Swanson PhD Chief, Professor in the Neurology department at Medical College of Wisconsin
MESH terms used to index this publication - Major topics in bold
Acoustic StimulationAdult
Age Factors
Brain
Education
Epilepsy
Female
Functional Laterality
Humans
Image Processing, Computer-Assisted
Language
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Male
Sex Factors
Speech Perception
Task Performance and Analysis
