Item Details

Use of reported speech in the communicative interactions of individuals with ventromedial prefrontal cortex damage

Issue: Vol 6 No. 1 (2015)

Journal: Journal of Interactional Research in Communication Disorders

Subject Areas: Linguistics

DOI: 10.1558/jircd.v6i1.97

Abstract:

Reported speech (RS) is a pervasive discourse practice in which speakers represent, or re-enact, words, thoughts, or feelings from other times and/or places, and it is thought to reflect and create emotional connections among interlocutors. The current study examines the role of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), a neural structure critical for social, emotional, and interpersonal behavior, in the use of reported speech. In the communicative interactions of six individuals with vmPFC damage and six healthy comparison participants, each interacting with a clinician, we compared the frequency and use of reported speech. Contrary to our predictions, the vmPFC participants did not differ from healthy participants in the frequency or use of reported speech. These results suggest that the vmPFC does not make critical contributions to the use of reported speech in conversation and furthers our understanding of neural and cognitive underpinnings of reported speech and language use.

Author: Melissa C. Duff, Jake Kurczek, Margaret A. Miller

View Original Web Page

References :

Adams, J. H., Doyle, D., Graham, D. I., Lawrence, E., McLellan, D. R., Gennarelli, T. A., et al. (1985). The contusion index: A reappraisal in human and experimental non-missile head injury. Neuropathology and Applied Neurobiology, 11 (4): 299–308. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2990.1985.tb00027.x


Adida, M., Maurel, M., Kaladijan, A., Fakra, E., Lazerges, P., Da Fonseca, D., Belzeaux, R., Cermolacce, M. and Azorin, M. (2011). Decision-making and schizophrenia. Encephale, 37: 110–116. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0013-7006(11)70036-7


Alexander, M., Benson, F. and Stuss, D. (1989). Frontal lobes and language. Brain and Language, 37 (4): 656–691. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0093-934X(89)90118-1


Anderson, S., Barrash, J., Bechara, A. and Tranel, D. (2006). Impairments of emotion and real-world complex behavior following childhood- or adult-onset damage to ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Journal of International Neuropsychological Society, 12 (2): 224–235. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1355617706060346


Anderson, S., Bechara, A., Damasio, H., Tranel, D. and Damasio, A. (1999). Impairment of social and moral behavior related to early damage inhuman prefrontal cortex. Nature Neuroscience, 2 (11): 1032–1037. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/14833


Bar-On, R., Tranel, D., Denburg, N. and Bechara, A. (2003). Exploring the neurological substrate of emotional and social intelligence. Brain, 126 (8): 1790–1800. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/awg177


Barrash, J., Tranel, D. and Anderson, S. W. (2000). Acquired personality disturbances associated with bilateral damage to the ventromedial prefrontal region. Developmental Neuropsychology, 18 (3): 355–381. http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/S1532694205Barrash


Beadle, J. (2011). The neuroanatomical basis of empathy: Is empathy following damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex? (Doctoral dissertation). Iowa Research Online (781).


Beadle, J. and Tranel, D. (2011). Social neuroscience: A neuropsychological perspective. In J. Cacioppo and J. Decety (Eds), Topics in Social Neuroscience. New York: Oxford University Press.


Bechara, A. and Damasio, A. (2005). The somatic marker hypothesis: A neural theory of economic decision. Games and Economic Behavior, 52 (2): 336–372. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geb.2004.06.010


Bechara, A., Damasio, A. R., Damasio, H. and Anderson, S. W. (1994). Insensitivity to future consequences following damage to human prefrontal cortex. Cognition,50 (1–3): 7–15. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0010-0277(94)90018-3


Bechara, A. Tranel, D. and Damasio, H. (2000). Characterization of the decision-making deficit of patients with ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions. Brain 123 (11): 2189–2202. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/123.11.2189


Beer, J. S., John, O. P., Scabini, D. and Knight, R. T. (2006). Orbitofrontal cortex and social behavior: Integrating self-monitoring and emotion–cognition interactions. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 18 (6): 871–879. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/jocn.2006.18.6.871


Body, R. (2007). Decision making and somatic markers in conversation after traumatic brain injury. Aphasiology, 21 (3/4), 394–408. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02687030600911450


Burgess, P. W., Quayle, A. and Firth, C. D. (2001). Brain regions involved in prospective memory as determined by positron emission tomography. Neuropsychologia, 39 (6): 545–555. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0028-3932(00)00149-4


Burgess, P. W., Scott, S. K. and Frith, C. D. (2003). The role of the rostral frontal cortex (area 10) in prospective memory: A lateral versus medial dissociation. Neuropsychologia 41 (8): 906–918. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0028-3932(02)00327-5


Clark, H. H. and Gerrig, R. J. (1990). Quotations as demonstrations. Language, 66: 764–805. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/414729


Craik, F. I. M., Moroz, T. M., Moscovitch, M., Stuss, D. T., Winocur, G., Tulving, E. and Kapur, S. (1999). In search of the self: A positron emission tomography study. Psychological Science, 10 (1): 26–34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-9280.00102


Croft, K. E., Duff, M. C., Kovach, C. K., Anderson, S. W., Adolphs, R. and Tranel, D. (2010). Detestable or marvelous? – Neuroanatomical correlates of character judgments. Neuropsychologia, 48 (6): 1789–1801. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2010.03.001


Damasio, A. R. (1994). Descartes’ Error. New York: Grosset/Putnam.


Damasio, A. R. (1996). The somatic marker hypothesis and the possible functions of the prefrontal cortex. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 351 (1346): 1413–1420. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1996.0125


D’Argembeau, A., Collette, F., Van der Linden, M., Laureys, S., Del Fiore, G., Degueldre, C., Luxen, A., et al., (2005). Self-referential reflective activity and its relationship with rest: A PET study. NeuroImage, 25 (2): 616–624. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2004.11.048


Duff, M.C. and Brown-Schmidt, S. (2012). The hippocampus and the flexible use and processing of language. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 6: 69. http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2012.00069


Duff, M. C., Hengst, J., Tranel, D. and Cohen, N. J. (2008). Collaborative discourse facilitates efficient communication and new learning in amnesia. Brain and Language, 106 (1): 41–54. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2007.10.004


Duff, M.C., Hengst, J., Tranel, D. and Cohen, N. J. (2007). Talking across time: Using reported speech as a communicative resource in amnesia. Aphasiology, 21 (6, 7, 8): 702–716.


Eslinger, P. J. (1998). Neurological and neuropsychological bases of empathy. European Neurology, 39 (4): 193–199. http://dx.doi.org/10.1159/000007933


Fellows, L. K. (2006). Deciding how to decide: Ventromedial frontal lobe damage affects information acquisition in multi-attribute decision making. Brain, 129 (4): 944–952. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/awl017


Fellows, L. K. and Farah, M. J. (2005). Dissociable elements of human foresight: A role for the ventromedial frontal lobes in framing the future, but not in discounting future rewards. Neuropsychologia, 43 (8): 1214–1221. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2004.07.018


Flaherty, A. (2005). Frontotemporal and dopaminergic control of idea generation and creative drive. Journal of Comparative Neurology, 493 (1): 147–153. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/cne.20768


Fossati, P., Hevenor, S. J., Lepage, M. Graham, S. J. Grady, C., Keightley, M. L., Craik, F. et al., (2004). Distributed self in episodic memory: Neural correlates of successful retrieval of self-encoded positive and negative personality traits. NeuroImage, 22 (4): 1596–1604. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2004.03.034


Fuster, J. M. (2001). The prefrontal cortex – An update: Time is of the essence. Neuron, 30 (2): 319–333. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0896-6273(01)00285-9


Gupta, R., Tranel, D. and Duff, M. C. (2012). Ventromedial prefrontal cortex damage does not impair the development and use of common ground in social interaction: Implications for cognitive theory of mind. Neuropsychologia, 25 (2): 137–146. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0021123


Gordon, R. G., Tranel, D. and Duff, M. C. (2014). The physiological basis of synchronizing conversational rhythms: A neuropsychological study. Neuropsychology, 28 (4): 624–630. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/neu0000073


Gusnard, D. A., Akbudak, E., Shulman, G. L. and Raichle, M. E. (2001). Medial prefrontal cortex and self-referential mental activity: Relation to a default mode of brain function. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98 (7): 4259–4264. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.071043098


Hengst, J. and Duff, M. C. (2007). Clinicians as communication partners: Developing a mediated discourse elicitation protocol. Topics in Language Disorders, 27: 36–47. http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/00011363-200701000-00005


Heberlein, A. S., Padon, A. A., Gillihan, S. J., Farah, M. J. and Fellows, L. K. (2008). Ventromedial frontal lobe plays a critical role in facial emotion recognition. J. Cogn. Neurosci., 20 (4): 721–733. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/jocn.2008.20049


Hengst, J., Frame, S., Neuman-Stritzl, T. and Gannaway, R. (2005). Using others’ words: Conversational use of reported speech by individuals with aphasia and their communication partners. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research, 48 (1): 137–156. http://dx.doi.org/10.1044/1092-4388(2005/011)


Kelley, W. M., Macrae, C. N., Wyland, C. L., Caglar, S., Inati, S. and Heatherton, T. F. (2002). Finding the self? An event-related fMRI study. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 14 (5): 785–794. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/08989290260138672


Koenigs, M. and Tranel, D. (2008). Prefrontal cortex damage abolishes brand-cued changes in cola preference. Social, Cognitive, and Affective Neuroscience, 3 (1): 1–6. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsm032


Kurczek, J. and Duff, M. C. (2011). Cohesion, coherence, and declarative memory: Discourse patterns of patients with hippocampal amnesia. Aphasiology, 25 (6–7): 700–712. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02687038.2010.537345


Kurczek, J. and Duff, M. C. (2012). Intact discourse cohesion and coherence following bilateral ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Brain and Language, 123 (3): 222–227. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bandl.2012.09.003


Levine, B. (2004). Functional neuroimaging of autobiographical memory. Brain and Cognition, 54 (2): 131.


Mah, L., Arnold, M. and Grafman, J. (2005). Deficits in social knowledge following damage to ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience, 17 (1): 66–74. http://dx.doi.org/10.1176/appi.neuropsych.17.1.66


Mattson, A. J. and Levin, H. S. (1990). Frontal lobe dysfunction following closed head injury. A review of the literature. Journal of Nervous & Mental Disorders, 178 (5): 282–291. http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/00005053-199005000-00002


McCarthy, M. (1998). Spoken Language and Applied Linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.


McDonald, S. (2005). Are you crying or laughing? Emotional recognition deficits after severe traumatic brain injury. Brain Impairment, 6 (1): 56–67. http://dx.doi.org/10.1375/brim.6.1.56.65481


Rolls, E. T. (1997). Consciousness in neural networks. Neural Networks, 10: 1227–1240. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0893-6080(97)00049-X


Rowe, A.D., Bullock, P. R., Polkey, C. E. and Morris, R. G., (2001). ‘Theory of mind’ impairments and their relationship to executive functioning following frontal lobe excisions. Brain, 124 (Pt 3): 600–616. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/124.3.600


Saver, J. L. and Damasio, A. R. (1991). Preserved access and processing of social knowledge in a patient with acquired sociopathy due to ventromedial frontal damage. Neuropsychologia, 29 (12): 1241–1249. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0028-3932(91)90037-9


Shamay-Tsoory, S. G., Tomer, R. and Aharon-Peretz, J. (2005). The neuroanatomical basis of understanding sarcasm and its relationship to social cognition. Neuropsychology, 19 (3): 288–300. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0894-4105.19.3.288


Shamay-Tsoory, S. G., Tomer, R., Goldsher, D., Berger, B. D. and Aharon-Peretz, J. (2004). Impairment in cognitive and affective empathy in patients with brain lesions: Anatomical and cognitive correlates. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology, 26 (8): 1113–1127. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13803390490515531


Shamay-Tsoory, S. G., Tomer, R., Berger, B. D. and Aharon-Peretz, J. (2003). Characterization of empathy deficits following prefrontal brain damage: The role of the right ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 15 (3): 324–337. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/089892903321593063


Shammi, P. and Stuss, D. T. (1999). Humour appreciation: A role of the right frontal lobe. Brain, 122 (4): 657–666. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/122.4.657


Schumann, J. H. (1999). A neurobiological basis for decision-making in language pragmatics. Pragmatics and Cognition, 7 (2): 283–311. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/pc.7.2.03sch


Simmons, J. S., Scholvinck, M. L., Gilbert, S. J., Frith, C. D. and Burgess, P. W. (2006). Differential components of prospective memory? Evidence from fMRI. Neuropsychologia, 44 (8): 1388–1397. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2006.01.005


Stone, V., Baron-Cohen, S. and Knight, R. (1998). Frontal lobe contributions to theory of mind. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 10 (5): 640–656. http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/089892998562942


Stuss, D., Gallup, G. and Anderson, M. (2001). The frontal lobes are necessary for ‘theory of mind’. Brain, 121 (2), 279–286. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/brain/124.2.279


Stuss, D. T. and Levine, B. (2002). Adult clinical neuropsychology: Lessons from studies of the frontal lobes. Annual Reviews of Psychology, 53: 401–433. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.53.100901.135220


Tannen, D. (1989). Talking Voices: Repetition, Dialogue, and Imagery in Conversational Discourse. New York: Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.


Ylvisaker, M., Feeney, T. and Szekers, S. (1998). Social-environmental approach to communication and behavior. In M. Ylvisaker and T. Feeney, T. (Eds). Collaborative Brain Injury Intervention: Positive Everyday Routines. San Diego, CA: Singular Publishing Group, Inc.