Connectivity of the left-ventral occipitotemporal cortex during visual word processing

The left-ventral occipito-temporal cortex (aka the Visual Word Form Area) plays a key role in reading. We used a combination of EEG and TMS (panel A) to assess the propagation of neural activity from that region to the rest of the brain. Cross-hemispheric neural propagation from the left to the right hemisphere was reduced when participants processed written words compared to non-linguistic input (Panel B) or performed high-level compared to low-level task on written words (Panel C). This modulation of effective connectivity may be linked to the left hemisphere lateralization that is typical of language processing.

 

Planton, S., Wang, S., Bolger, D., Bonnard, M., & Pattamadilok, C. (2022). Effective connectivity of the left-ventral occipito-temporal cortex during visual word processing: Direct causal evidence from TMS-EEG co-registration. Cortex, 154, 167-183. @HAL.

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