Sentence Processing of Japanese Sign Language: An fMRI study

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26580070
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Linguistics
• Research Institution: Kyoto Women's University (2015-2016); Tohoku University (2014)
• Principal Investigator: KIM JUNGHO 京都女子大学, 文学部, 准教授 (70513852)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: 文処理 / 語順 / 日本手話

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Japanese Sign Language is a well-known free word order language. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we investigated the effects of word order on cortical activation by directly comparing the brain regions involved in the processing of JSL sentences with SOV and OSV word order. The result showed more activation at the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and the left dorsal prefrontal cortex (DPFC) during the comprehension of OSV sentences than that of SOV sentences. These results support the linguistic hypothesis that a OSV sentence is syntactically more complex than its SOV counterpart.

Free Research Field

言語学