2011 Fiscal Year Final Research Report
A study of brain activity during syntactic processing of Japanese EFL learners : Data obtained from NIRS and MRI measurement
| Project/Area Number |
21520598
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Foreign language education
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| Research Institution | Nihon University |
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Principal Investigator |
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
UEDA Yukiko 秋田大学, 教育文化学部, 准教授 (90447194)
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| Co-Investigator(Renkei-kenkyūsha) |
TSUNASHIMA Hitoshi 日本大学, 生産工学部, 教授 (30287594)
CHUUJOU Kiyomi 日本大学, 生産工学部, 教授 (50261889)
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| Research Collaborator |
NAKAMURA Kazuhiro 秋田県立脳血管研究センター, 研究部門, 主任研究員 (10312638)
HASHIMOTO Yousuke 国際教養大学, 公私立大学の部局等, 講師 (30568770)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2009 – 2011
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| Keywords | 文処理 / 第二言語習得 / 照応形 / fNIRS / fMRI |
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| Research Abstract |
In this study, we measure the Broca's-area brain activity patterns of Japanese speakers during syntactic processing using functional brain imaging such as fNIRS and fMRI. In our experiments, we use Japanese as a native language, and English as a foreign language of Japanese native speakers. The stimulus sentences in our experiment include anaphors such as zibun '-self' or himself/herself. It is assumed that processing of a sentence with an anaphor involves an analysis of its sentence structure and, accordingly causes brain activation in Broca's area. Some increase in blood flow within Broca's area was observed during processing of Japanese sentences with anaphor through use of fMRI. Other data, especially obtained during processing of English as a foreign language, have been under analysis.
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