Neuroimaging contributions to the understanding of discourse processes

Neuroimaging research is providing new types of information and insight about the cortical activity underlying discourse processing. Knowing the intensity and location of the brain activity during discourse comprehension adds significantly to the information provided by behavioral measures alone. The combination of neuroimaging data and behaviorally based discourse theories indicate that discourse processing is underpinned by a system of several distinguishable cortical networks that are activated for discourse processing, above and beyond the activation evoked by comprehension at the word and sentence level. Whereas the multiplicities of the processes in discourse comprehension are sometimes seen as a drawback to behavioral experiments, it is something of a benefit in neuroimaging research. Controlled neuroimaging experiments, with their multidimensional measures, can help determine when each of these components contributes to discourse processing. By making some assumptions about the cortical regions/network that underlie this processing, we can begin to determine when an area becomes activated and to what degree it is activated as a function of the discourse properties.