Abstract
ness and modality of interpersonal communication have a considerable impact on comprehension. They are relevant for determining thoughts and constituting internal models of the environment. Whereas concrete object-related information can be represented in mind irrespective of language, abstract concepts require a representation in speech. Consequently, modality-independent processing of abstract information can be expected. Here we investigated the neural correlates of abstractness (abstract vs. concrete) and modality (speech vs. gestures), to identify an abstractness-specific supramodal neural network. During fMRI data acquisition 20 participants were presented with videos of an actor either speaking sentences with an abstract-social [AS] or concrete-object-related content [CS], or performing meaningful abstract-social emblematic [AG] or concrete-object-related tool-use gestures [CG]. Gestures were accompanied by a foreign language to increase the comparability between conditions and to frame the communication context of the gesture videos. Participants performed a content judgment task referring to the person vs. object-relatedness of the utterances. The behavioral data suggest a comparable comprehension of contents communicated by speech or gesture. Furthermore, we found common neural processing for abstract information independent of modality (AS > CS ∩ AG > CG) in a left hemispheric network including the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), temporal pole, and medial frontal cortex. Modality specific activations were found in bilateral occipital, parietal, and temporal as well as right inferior frontal brain regions for gesture (G > S) and in left anterior temporal regions and the left angular gyrus for the processing of speech semantics (S > G). These data support the idea that abstract concepts are represented in a supramodal manner. Consequently, gestures referring to abstract concepts are processed in a predominantly left hemispheric language related neural network.
Highlights
Human communication is distinctly characterized by the ability to convey abstract concepts such as feeling, evaluations, cultural symbols, or theoretical assumptions
In line with other studies that contrasted the processing of a native against an unknown foreign language (Perani et al, 1996; Schlosser et al, 1998; Pallier et al, 2003; Straube et al, 2012), we found activation along the left temporal lobe for German speech contrasted with Russian speech and gesture
In line with studies on action observation (e.g., Decety et al, 1997; Decety and Grèzes, 1999; Grèzes and Decety, 2001; Filimon et al, 2007) and co-verbal gesture processing (e.g., Green et al, 2009; Kircher et al, 2009b; Straube et al, 2011a), we found for the processing of gesture in contrast to speech information a bilaterally distributed network of activation including occipital, parietal, posterior temporal, and right frontal brain regions
Summary
Human communication is distinctly characterized by the ability to convey abstract concepts such as feeling, evaluations, cultural symbols, or theoretical assumptions. This can be differentiated from references to our physical environment consisting of concrete objects and their relationships to each other. In addition to our language capacity, humans employ gestures as flexible tool to communicate both concrete and abstract information (Kita et al, 2007; Straube et al, 2011a). The investigation of abstractness and modality of communicated information can deliver important insight into the neural representation of concrete and abstract meaning. Up to now, evidence about communalities or differences in the neural processing of abstract vs concrete meaning communicated by speech vs gesture is missing. A hierarchical model of language and thought has been suggested (Perlovsky and Ilin, 2010) which proposes that abstract thinking is impossible without speech
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