Language is a uniquely human cognitive function, which greatly defines and determines our psychological and social traits. Despite the importance of language and speech, they remain among the least understood human cognitive processes, and their neurobiological underpinnings are still poorly understood

Martín-Luengo, Beatriz

Myachykov, Andriy

Shcherbakova, Olga

Shtyrov, Yury

Northumbria Research Link

Northumbria Research LinkCitation: Shcherbakova, Olga, Myachykov, Andriy, Martín-Luengo, Beatriz and Shtyrov, Yury (2020) Editorial: Brain-Behaviour Interfaces in Linguistic Communication. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 14. ISSN 1662-5161 Published by: Frontiers in Human NeuroscienceURL: https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2020.00324 <https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2020.00324>This  version  was  downloaded  from  Northumbria  Research  Link: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/45566/Northumbria University has developed Northumbria Research Link (NRL) to enable users to access the University’s research output. Copyright © and moral rights for items on NRL are retained by the individual author(s) and/or other copyright owners.  Single copies of full items can be reproduced, displayed or performed, and given to third parties in any format or medium for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge, provided the authors, title and full bibliographic details are given, as well as a hyperlink and/or URL to the original metadata page. The content must not be changed in any way. Full items must not be sold commercially in any  format or medium without formal permission of the copyright holder.  The full policy is available online: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/pol  i cies.html  This  document  may differ  from the  final,  published version of  the research  and has been made available online in accordance with publisher policies. To read and/or cite from the published version of the research, please visit the publisher’s website (a subscription may be required.)                        EDITORIALpublished: 11 September 2020doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2020.00324Frontiers in Human Neuroscience | www.frontiersin.org 1 September 2020 | Volume 14 | Article 324Edited and reviewed by:Kirrie J. Ballard,The University of Sydney, Australia*Correspondence:Olga Shcherbakovao.shcherbakova@spbu.ruSpecialty section:This article was submitted toSpeech and Language,a section of the journalFrontiers in Human NeuroscienceReceived: 23 June 2020Accepted: 21 July 2020Published: 11 September 2020Citation:Shcherbakova O, Myachykov A,Martín-Luengo B and Shtyrov Y (2020)Editorial: Brain-Behaviour Interfaces inLinguistic Communication.Front. Hum. Neurosci. 14:324.doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2020.00324Editorial: Brain-Behaviour Interfacesin Linguistic CommunicationOlga Shcherbakova 1,2*, Andriy Myachykov 3,4, Beatriz Martín-Luengo 4 and Yury Shtyrov 2,51Department of General Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, Saint Petersburg State University, Saint Petersburg, Russia,2 Laboratory of Behavioural Neurodynamics, Saint Petersburg State University, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 3Department ofPsychology, Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom, 4Centre for Cognition and Decision Making,National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia, 5Department of Clinical Medicine, Center ofFunctionally Integrative Neuroscience, Aarhus University, Aarhus, DenmarkKeywords: brain, language, EEG, neurolinguistic, psycholinguistic, embodied cognitionEditorial on the Research TopicBrain-Behaviour Interfaces in Linguistic CommunicationLanguage is a uniquely human cognitive function, which greatly defines and determines ourpsychological and social traits. Despite the importance of language and speech, they remain amongthe least understood human cognitive processes, and their neurobiological underpinnings are stillpoorly understood.In recent decades, an immense body of diverse data illuminating the neural bases oflanguage processes in both children and adults has been acquired through the use of manyadvanced techniques. These include electroencephalography (EEG), magnetoencephalography(MEG), functional magnetic-resonance imaging (fMRI), transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS),transcranial direct and alternating current stimulation (tDCS, tACS), eye-tracking, behavioralmeasures, etc. The combined power of these techniques continues to shed light upon the brainmechanisms of language acquisition, comprehension and processing, speech disorders, theirdiagnosis and treatment, as well as the interplay between language and other neurocognitivesystems and functions.The aim of the Research Topic Brain-Behavior Interfaces in Linguistic Communication is toprovide a state-of-the-art overview of this diverse and multidisciplinary area of research, witha special emphasis on bridging the gap between different research fields, theoretical views,and methodologies.Our Research Topic offers a collection of 14 articles on various facets of linguistic behaviorand its neural underpinnings. The collection comprises 11 research papers (including six originalresearch reports and five brief research reports), one comprehensive review, one mini review, andone opinion paper.The collection can be topically divided into several groups of papers. The first groupbrings together several articles using electroencephalography in order to investigate the neuralbases of language learning and use. The opinion article by Shtyrov et al. addresses theeffectiveness and neural underpinning of two main routes of novel word acquisition: (1)explicit encoding and (2) implicit learning (fast mapping). The authors discuss methodologicalconfounds besetting existing research paradigms and provide a clear perspective for designinga comprehensive and fully balanced experimental approach for comparing these two languagelearning modes. The experimental study described by Vasilyeva et al. follows up on thisand investigates the neural bases of fast mapping in adults by documenting near-instantchanges in neural activity after a single-shot novel word training. The authors concludethat fast mapping may promote rapid integration of newly learned items into the brain’sneural lexicon, even into adulthood. In a related article on ERP correlates of novelword learning, Bermúdez-Margaretto et al. show how novel words repeatedly associatedShcherbakova et al. Editorial: Brain-Behavior Interfaces in Linguistic Communicationwith meaningful cues demonstrate a higher attenuation ofN400 responses than the words trained in a basic orthographiccondition, confirming facilitation of the lexico-semanticprocessing of these stimuli as a consequence of semanticassociation. This finding suggests that novel word learningcould be influenced by the activation of the categorization-related network. Next, the contribution by Ovchinnikova et al.investigated auditory event-related potentials in children rearedin two very different types of environment: biological-family careor institutional care. The paper makes an important contributionconcerning the role of social environment in neurocognitivematuration. den Hollander et al. further inform this debate byusing EEG for identifying the speech production stages in earlyand late adulthood. They report no scalp distribution differencesbetween the two groups suggesting that the same networks areinvolved at different stages, regardless of the age, even though thetiming of the individual stages is different between the groups.Alday and Kretzschmar used ERP and multiple-response speed-accuracy trade-off (SAT) paradigm to investigate the relationshipbetween N400 and P300 ERP components. The article clarifieshow these two classic ERP potentials determine behavioralprofiles. With the use of multivariate Bayesian mixed-effectsmodels, GLMM-based approach, and partial effects, the paperdemonstrates how overlapping ERP responses in one sample ofparticipants predict behavioral SAT profiles of another sample.Moreover, this research confirms that the P300 and N400reflect two independent but interacting processes and that thecompetition between these processes is reflected differently inthe speed-accuracy trade-off behavior. Finally, in an EEG studyon a language in transition (Icelandic) Bornkessel-Schlesewskyet al. show that the neurophysiological responses already reflectprojected language changes that are not yet apparent in the overtbehavior of native speakers.Another set of articles address semantic aspects of languagelearning and use. The mini review by Mkrtychian et al. offers asnapshot of psycholinguistic and neurocognitive approaches tostudying concrete and abstract semantics. A review by Monacoet al. discusses the role of embodied semantics in secondlanguage comprehension arguing that L2 is embodied differentlythan L1 (which might have important clinical implications).Lastly, the research by Calabria et al. addresses the issue ofsemantic processing in bilingual (Catalan—Spanish) aphasia. Theresults suggest that lexical retrieval in individuals with bilingualaphasia may be selectively impaired within their non-dominantlanguage due to an excessive amount of inhibition placed uponthis language.Two contributions from our collection focus on investigatingreading processes using eye-tracking. Lou et al. suggest that eyemovements during reading can be influenced by themotivation ofself-enhancement in addition to various stimulus’ properties andcognitive factors; this also indicates that eye-tracking can be usedto study implicit social cognition. Research presented by Petrovaet al. shows that readers process information better and faster whilereading sketch-notes than verbal texts; additionally, various typesof sketch-notes differ in terms of how good the readers are infollowing the order of elements.Finally, two articles offer examples of behavioralpsycholinguistic research. Niebuhr et al. report the results ofa 12-weeks prosodic charisma training that is shown to bemore beneficial for female speakers as opposed to male ones.Pokhoday et al. report new evidence about the role of thespeaker’s attention (manipulated by visual priming) and eventorientation in sentence production by using a flexible word-orderlanguage, Russian.In conclusion, the present Research Topic will undoubtedlycontribute to a better understanding of how neurocognitivesystems provide humans with language and will help to furtherunveil the backstage of our intrinsic communication abilities.AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONSOS and YS conceived the paper and the Research Topic. OS,YS, AM, and BM-L contributed to the final version of themanuscript. All authors contributed to the article and approvedthe submitted version.ACKNOWLEDGMENTSThis issue became possible as a result of a series of internationalmeetings on Neurobiology of Speech and Language organizedby the Laboratory of Behavioural Neurodynamics of SaintPetersburg State University. This work was financially supportedby the Government of Russian Federation (grant contract no.14.W03.31.0010).Conflict of Interest: The authors declare that the research was conducted in theabsence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as apotential conflict of interest.Copyright © 2020 Shcherbakova,Myachykov,Martín-Luengo and Shtyrov. This is anopen-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons AttributionLicense (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted,provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that theoriginal publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academicpractice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not complywith these terms.Frontiers in Human Neuroscience | www.frontiersin.org 2 September 2020 | Volume 14 | Article 324

Editorial: Brain-Behaviour Interfaces in Linguistic Communication

http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/45566/1/fnhum-14-00324.pdf

Editorial: Brain-Behaviour Interfaces in Linguistic Communication

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Northumbria Research Link