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- Title
Stimulating Multiple-Demand Cortex Enhances Vocabulary Learning.
- Authors
Sliwinska, Magdalena W.; Violante, Inês R.; Wise, Richard J. S.; Leech, Robert; Devlin, Joseph T.; Geranmayeh, Fatemeh; Hampshire, Adam
- Abstract
It is well established that networks within multiple-demand cortex (MDC) become active when diverse skills and behaviors are being learnt. However, their causal role in learning remains to be established. In the present study,wefirst performed functional magnetic resonance imaging on healthy female and male human participants to confirm that MDC was most active in the initial stages of learning a novel vocabulary, consisting of pronounceable nonwords (pseudowords), each associated with a picture of a real object.Wethen examined, in healthy female and malehumanparticipants, whether repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation of a frontal midline node of the cingulo-opercularMDCaffected learningratesspecificallyduringtheinitialstagesoflearning.Wereportthatstimulationofthisnode,butnotacontrolbrainregion,substantially improvedbothaccuracyandresponsetimesduringtheearliest stage oflearningpseudoword-object associations.Thisstimulationhadnoeffect on the processing of established vocabulary, tested by the accuracy and response times when participants decided whether a real word was accurately paired with a picture of an object. These results provide evidence that noninvasive stimulation to MDC nodes can enhance learning rates, thereby demonstrating their causal role in the learning process. We propose that this causal role makesMDCcandidate target for experimental therapeutics; for example, in stroke patients with aphasia attempting to reacquire a vocabulary.
- Subjects
CEREBRAL cortex; FUNCTIONAL magnetic resonance imaging; TRANSCRANIAL magnetic stimulation; NEUROSCIENCES; LEARNING
- Publication
Journal of Neuroscience, 2017, Vol 37, Issue 32, p7606
- ISSN
0270-6474
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3857-16.2017