Distinct neural patterns for two languages
Philip L. Yeagle · Science · 2017
Neurolinguistics People fluent in more than one language can be something of an enigma to observers. Perhaps counterintuitively, available data suggests that multiple language processing occurs in a common system in the human brain. Xu et al. challenged this interpretation with a fine-grained multivoxel pattern analysis of functional magnetic resonance imaging data. Chinese-English bilingual subjects processed the two different languages using independent systems of brain cells, whose physical locations in the brain overlapped. Thus, each language in these individuals uses its own set of neurons. Sci. Adv. 10.1126/sciadv.1603309 (2017).