Article information
Abstract
Introduction
The description of bilingual aphasic patients goes back to the 19th century. Since then, the study of the relationship between bilingualism and the brain has questioned whether the neuroanatomical representation of two languages in the same brain is similar or different. The answer to this question has generated erroneous interpretations based on the results of the investigations carried out on this topic.
DevelopmentThe present paper will try to distinguish between myth and reality of the following statements: a) the neuroanatomical organization of language in bilinguals is different from that of monolinguals, and b) language is less lateralized in bilingual speakers.
ResultsThere is no reason to believe in the existence of qualitative differences in the cerebral organization of language between bilinguals and monolinguals. It is most likely that two languages are represented as different microanatomical subsystems in the same cerebral regions.
ConclusionsThe differences are quantitative rather than qualitative, that is, the degree of participation of the different neurofunctional mechanisms involved in the use of language, such as metalinguistic knowledge and implicit linguistic competence.
Keywords:
Neurolinguistics
Bilingualism
Aphasia
Language representation
Language lateralization
Resumen
Introducción
La descripción de pacientes bilingües con afasia se remonta al siglo xix. Desde entonces, el estudio de la relación bilingüismo-cerebro se ha preguntado si la representación neuroanatómica de las lenguas que habla una misma persona es similar o diferente. La respuesta a esta pregunta ha generado interpretaciones erróneas de los resultados obtenidos en las investigaciones realizadas al respecto.
Material y métodosEn el presente trabajo, se describirá lo que hay de mito y de realidad en las siguientes afirmaciones: a) la organización neuroanatómica del lenguaje en el bilingüe es diferente del monolingüe, y b) la lateralización del lenguaje en el bilingüe es menor.
ResultadosNo hay motivos para creer que haya diferencias cualitativas en la organización cerebral del lenguaje en bilingües y monolingües. Lo más probable es que las lenguas que habla una misma persona estén representadas como subsistemas microanatómicos distintos en las mismas regiones cerebrales.
ConclusionesLas diferencias serían más bien de tipo cuantitativo, es decir, con relación al grado de participación de los diferentes mecanismos neurofuncionales implicados en el uso del lenguaje, entre ellos el conocimiento metalingüístico y la competencia lingüística implícita.
Palabras clave:
Neurolingüística
Bilingüismo
Afasia
Representación del lenguaje
Lateralización del lenguaje
Full text is only aviable in PDF
References
[1.]
En: Gordon RG, editors. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. 15.ª ed. Dallas: SIL International; 2005.
[2.]
Leclerc J. Le multilinguisme: un phénomène universel, 2002 [citado 21 de mayo 2008]. Disponible en: http://www.tlfq.ulaval.ca/axl/Langues/3cohabitation_phenom-universel.htm.
[3.]
F. Grosjean.
Life with two languages. An introduction to bilingualism.
Harvard University Press, (1982),
[5.]
M. Paradis.
Bilingualism and aphasia. Studies in Neurolinguistics. 3.
Academic Press, (1977),
[6.]
M. Paradis.
Bilingual and polyglot aphasia. Handbook of Neuropsychology. 2.
Elsevier Science Publishers, (1989),
[7.]
F. Fabbro.
The neurolinguistics of bilingualism.
Psychology Press, (1999),
[11.]
W.E. Lambert, S. Fillenbaum.
A pilot study of aphasia among bilinguals.
Can J Psychol, 13 (1959), pp. 28-34
[12.]
R.L. Raport, C.T. Tan, H.A. Whitaker.
Language function and dysfunction among Chinese and English speaking polyglots: Cortical stimulation. Wada testing, and clinical studies.
Brain Lang, 18 (1983), pp. 342-366
[15.]
M.L. Berthier, S.E. Starkstein, P. Lylyk, R. Leiguarda.
Differential recovery of languages in a bilingual patient: a case study using selective Amytal test.
Brain Lang, 38 (1990), pp. 449-453
[16.]
E. Gomez-Tortosa, E.M. Martin, M. Gaviria, F. Charbel, J.I. Ausman.
Selective deficit of one language in a bilingual patient following surgery in the left perisylvian area.
Brain Lang, 48 (1995), pp. 320-325
[17.]
G.A. Ojemann.
Brain organization for language from the perspective of electrical stimulation mapping.
Behav Brain Sci, 6 (1983), pp. 189-230
[18.]
T.H. Lucas, G.M. McKhann, G.A. Ojemann.
Functional separation of languages in the bilingual brain.
J Neurosurg, 101 (2004), pp. 449-457
[19.]
R.J. Zatorre.
On the representation of multiple languages in the brain: old problems and new directions.
Brain Lang, 36 (1989), pp. 127-147
[20.]
M. Paradis.
Multilingualism and Aphasia.
Linguistic disorders and pathologies: an international handbook, pp. 278-288
[21.]
M. Paradis.
Selective deficit in one language is not a demonstration of different anatomical representation: Comments on Gomez-Tortosa et al (1995).
Brain Lang, 54 (1996), pp. 170-173
[22.]
F. Fabbro.
The bilingual brain: Cerebral representation of languages.
Brain Lang, 79 (2001), pp. 211-222
[23.]
M. Paradis.
Differential recovery of languages in a bilingual patient following selective amytal injection: a comment on Berthier et al (1990).
Brain Lang, 39 (1990), pp. 469-470
[24.]
E. Gomez-Tortosa, E.M. Martin, M. Gaviria, F. Charbel, J.I. Ausman.
Selective deficit of one language in a bilingual patient: replies to Paradis and Hines.
Brain Lang, 54 (1996), pp. 174-175
[25.]
D. Klein, B. Milner, R.J. Zatorre, E. Meyer, A.C. Evans.
The neural substrates underlying word generation: a bilingual functional-imaging study.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 92 (1995), pp. 2889-2903
[26.]
M.W.L. Chee, E.W.L. Tan, T. Thiel.
Mandarin and English single word processing studied with functional magnetic resonance imaging.
J Neurosci, 19 (1999), pp. 3050-3056
[27.]
D. Klein, B. Milner, R.J. Zatorre, V. Zhao, J. Nikelski.
Cerebral organization in bilinguals: a PET study of Chinese-English verb generation.
Neuroreport, 10 (1999), pp. 2841-2846
[28.]
A.E. Hernandez, A. Martinez, K. Kohnert.
In search of the language switch: an fMRI study of picture naming in Spanish-English bilinguals.
Brain Lang, 73 (2000), pp. 421-431
[29.]
R. De Bleser, P. Dupont, J. Postler, G. Bormans, D. Speelman, L. Mortelmans, et al.
The organisation of the bilingual lexicon: a PET study.
J Neurolinguistics, 16 (2003), pp. 439-456
[30.]
D. Perani, J. Abutalebi, E. Paulesu, S. Brambati, P. Scifo, S.F. Cappa, et al.
The role of age of adquisition and language usage in early, high-proficient bilinguals: an fMRI study during verbal fluency.
Hum Brain Mapp, 19 (2003), pp. 170-182
[31.]
D. Perani, E. Paulesu, N.S. Galles, E. Dupoux, S. Dehaene, V. Bettinardi, et al.
The bilingual brain. Proficiency and age of acquisition of the second language.
Brain, 121 (1998), pp. 1841-1852
[32.]
M.W. Chee, D. Caplan, C.S. Soon, N. Sriram, E.W. Tan, T. Thiel, et al.
Processing of visually presented sentences in Mandarin and English studied with fMRI.
Neuron, 23 (1999), pp. 127-137
[33.]
M.W. Chee, N. Hon, H.L. Lee, C.S. Soon.
Relative language proficiency modulates BOLD signal change when bilinguals perform semantic judgments. Blood oxygen level dependent.
Neuroimage, 13 (2001), pp. 1155-1163
[34.]
J.J. Pillai, J.M. Araque, J.D. Allison, S. Sethuraman, D.W. Loring, D. Thiruvaiyaru, et al.
Functional MRI study of semantic and phonological language processing in bilingual subjects: preliminary findings.
Neuroimage, 19 (2003), pp. 565-576
[35.]
Y. Tatsuno, K.L. Sakai.
Language-related activations in the left prefrontal regions are differentially modulated by age, proficiency, and task demands.
J Neurosci, 25 (2005), pp. 1637-1644
[36.]
S. Yokoyama, H. Okamoto, T. Miyamoto, K. Yoshimoto, J. Kim, K. Iwata, et al.
Cortical activation in the processing of passive sentences in L1 and L2: an fMRI study.
Neuroimage, 30 (2006), pp. 570-579
[37.]
D. Perani, J. Abutalebi.
The neural basis of first and second language processing.
Curr Opin Neurobiol, 15 (2005), pp. 202-206
[38.]
J. Abutalebi.
Neural aspects of second language representation and language control.
Acta Psychol (Amst), 128 (2008), pp. 466-478
[39.]
J. Ertl, E.W. Schafer.
Brain response correlates of psychometric intelligence.
Nature, 223 (1969), pp. 421-422
[42.]
F. Fabbro, M. Skrap, S. Aglioti.
Pathological switching between languages after frontal lesions in a bilingual patient.
J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry, 68 (2000), pp. 650-652
[43.]
P. Holtzheimer, W. Fawaz, C. Wilson, D. Avery.
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation may induce language switching in bilingual patients.
Brain Lang, 94 (2005), pp. 274-277
[44.]
K.H. Kho, H. Duffau, P. Gatignol, F.S. Leijten, N.F. Ramsey, P.C. Van Rijen, et al.
Involuntary language switching in two bilingual patients during the Wada test and intraoperative electrocortical stimulation.
Brain Lang, 101 (2007), pp. 31-37
[45.]
S. Aglioti, F. Fabbro.
Paradoxical selective recovery in a bilingual aphasic following subcortical lesion.
Neuroreport, 4 (1993), pp. 1359-1362
[46.]
S. Aglioti, A. Beltramello, F. Girardi, F. Fabbro.
Neurolinguistic and follow-up study of an unusual pattern of recovery from bilingual subcortical aphasia.
Brain, 119 (1996), pp. 1551-1564
[47.]
J. Abutalebi, A. Miozzo, S.F. Cappa.
Do subcortical structures control “language selection” in polyglots? Evidence from pathological language mixing.
Neurocase, 6 (2000), pp. 51-56
[48.]
J.L. Cummings.
Frontal-subcortical circuits and human behavior.
Arch Neurol, 50 (1993), pp. 873-880
[49.]
J. Abutalebi, D. Green.
Bilingual language production: the neurocognition of language representation and control.
J Neurolinguistics, 20 (2007), pp. 242-275
[50.]
M. Paradis.
Declarative and procedural determinants of second languages. Language and communication in multilinguals.
John Benjamins Publishing Company, (2009),
[52.]
M.L. Albert, K. Obler.
The bilingual Brain.
Academic Press, (1978),
[53.]
R. Hull, J. Vaid.
Bilingual language lateralization: a meta-analytic tale of two hemispheres.
Neuropsychologia, 45 (2007), pp. 1987-2008
[54.]
D. Perani, S. Dehaene, F. Grassi, L. Cohen, S.F. Cappa, E. Dupoux, et al.
Brain processing of native and foreign languages.
Neuroreport, 7 (1996), pp. 2439-2444
[55.]
S. Dehaene, E. Dupoux, J. Mehler, L. Cohen, E. Paulesu, D. Perani, et al.
Anatomical variability in the cortical representation of first and second language.
Neuroreport, 8 (1997), pp. 3809-3815
[56.]
M. Paradis.
Language lateralization in bilinguals: Enough already!.
Brain Lang, 39 (1990), pp. 576-586
[57.]
M. Paradis.
The Loch Ness Monster approach to bilingual language lateralization: a response to Berquier and Ashton.
Brain Lang, 43 (1992), pp. 534-537
[58.]
M. Paradis.
Another sighting on differential language laterality in multilinguals, this time in Lok Tok Pising: comments on Wuellemin, Richardson, and Lynch (1994).
Brain Lang, 49 (1995), pp. 173-186
[59.]
M. Paradis.
The bilingual Loch Ness Monster raises its non-asymmetric head again-or, why bother with such cumbersome notions as validity and reliability? Comments on Evans et al (2002).
Brain Lang, 87 (2003), pp. 441-448
[60.]
M. Paradis.
Bilingual laterality: unfounded claim of validity. A comment on Hull and Vaid (2007).
Neuropsychologia, 46 (2008), pp. 1588-1590
[61.]
P. Chary.
Aphasia in a multilingual society: a preliminary study.
Language processing in bilinguals: psycholinguistic and neuropsychological perspectives, pp. 183-197
[62.]
P. Karanth, G.N. Rangamani.
Crossed aphasia in multilinguals.
Brain Lang, 34 (1988), pp. 169-180
[63.]
D. Solin.
The systematic misrepresentation of bilingual crossed aphasia data and its consequences.
Brain Lang, 36 (1989), pp. 92-116
[64.]
M. Paradis.
A neurolinguistic theory of bilingualism.
John Benjamins, (2004),
[65.]
M. Paradis.
Neurolinguistic aspects of implicit and explicit memory: implications for bilingualism and SLA.
Implicit and explicit learning of languages, pp. 393-418
[66.]
M. Paradis.
Language and communication disorders in multilinguals.
Handbook of the neuroscience of language, pp. 341-349
[67.]
A. Ku, E.A. Lachmann, W. Nagler.
Selective language aphasia from herpes simplex encephalitis.
Pediatr Neurol, 15 (1996), pp. 169-171
[68.]
A. García-Caballero, I. García-Lado, J. González-Hermida, R. Area, M.J. Recimil, O. Juncos Rabadán, et al.
Paradoxical recovery in a bilingual patient with aphasia after right capsuloputaminal infarction.
J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry, 78 (2007), pp. 89-91
[69.]
M. Paradis.
Aspects of bilingual aphasia.
Pergamon, (1995),
Copyright © 2010. Sociedad Española de Neurología
