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Planned Work – Are attentional and/or language networks causally involved in native English speakers' bias to represent action sentences congruently with English's reading direction (left-to-right)?
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Poster C121 in Poster Session C, Wednesday, October 25, 10:15 am - 12:00 pm CEST, Espace Vieux-Port
This poster is part of the Sandbox Series.
Tslil Ofir1, Johan Hulleman1, Gorana Pobric1; 1The University of Manchester
Early research suggested that humans have a universal preference for left-to-right (LTR) spatial exploration and information processing due to hemispheric specialisation (Beaumont, 1985). Later studies supported this theory by showing attentional LTR bias in a variety of spatial tasks (e.g., Ossandón et al., 2014). The attentional LTR bias was also seen in psycholinguistics research, specifically in the processing of action sentences, where speakers of languages with an LTR reading direction processed the sentences faster when the agent was on the left and the object on the right (Chatterjee et al., 1999). However, the universality of this attentional LTR bias was challenged by cross-linguistic studies involving speakers with a right-to-left (RTL) reading direction, who were found to process faster action sentences with the agent on the right (i.e., implying an RTL direction) (Maass & Russo, 2003; Dobel et al., 2007). Suitner and Maass (2016) and Chatterjee (2010) proposed two hypotheses to explain these findings. Both theories maintain that the universal attentional LTR bias influences language processing and that the bias can be influenced by repeated experiences that strengthen (for LTR readers) or weaken (for RTL readers). Suitner and Maass (2016) claim that the attentional network of the brain drives this LTR language bias, whereas Chatterjee (2010) argues that the language network is involved in its formation. Neither theory, however, predicts or addresses the specific brain areas involved in and affected by universal attentional bias. Determining whether the LTR language bias contributes to effective language comprehension and whether it is causally related to attentional and/or language networks could have clinical implications for treating language processing difficulties. In our proposed study, we intend to test these two theories and answer the questions: is visuospatial attention driving the LTR language bias? (Suitner and Maass, 2016), and is the reading network critical for the LTR language bias? (Chatterjee, 2010). To that end, we will employ a standardized complex sentence-picture verification task and use eye-tracking and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to temporarily interfere with brain processing. We plan to stimulate the following brain networks: 1) Attentional network areas (e.g., the posterior parietal cortex) that were demonstrated to be critical for directing attention during visual processing of written language (Turker & Hartwigsen, 2021; Leff et al., 2001), as well as in various visuospatial and scanning tasks (Pourtois et al., 2001; Muggleton et al., 2006). 2) Language network areas (e.g., ventral anterior temporal lobe) that were proposed to be involved in action semantics processing (Quandt et al., 2017), and thus are likely to play a role in the formation of directional asymmetry as part of action semantics processing. We hypothesise that TMS stimulation of the attentional network will affect scanning patterns (i.e., attentional LTR bias) and total reaction times, whereas stimulation of the reading network will result in slower responses when the agent is on the left (i.e., weaken the LRT language bias) due to disruption of appropriate semantic integration. We do not anticipate either network stimulation having a significant effect on task accuracy rates.
Topic Areas: Reading, Meaning: Lexical Semantics