Journal
NEUROIMAGE
Volume 199, Issue -, Pages 454-465Publisher
ACADEMIC PRESS INC ELSEVIER SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.06.022
Keywords
Bilingualism; Effective connectivity; fMRI; Language switching; Task switching
Funding
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [31871097, 31500924]
- Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities [2017XTCX04]
- MOE Project of Key Research Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences at Universities [13JJD740009]
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For bilinguals, language control is needed for selecting the target language during language production. Numerous studies have examined the neural correlates of language control and shown a close relationship between language control and domain-general cognitive control. However, it remains unknown how these brain regions coordinate with each other when bilinguals exert cognitive control over linguistic and nonlinguistic representations. We addressed this gap using an extended unified structural equation modeling (euSEM) approach. Sixty-five Chinese-English bilinguals performed language switching and nonverbal switching tasks during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning. The results showed that language control was served by a cooperative brain network, including the frontal lobe, the parietal cortex, subcortical areas, and the cerebellum. More importantly, we found that language control recruited more subcortical areas and connections from frontal to subcortical areas compared with domain-general cognitive control, demonstrating a reconfigurable brain network. In addition, the reconfiguration efficiency of the brain network was mainly determined by general cognitive ability but was also mediated by second language (L2) proficiency. These findings provide the first data-driven connectivity model that specifies the brain network for language control in bilinguals and also shed light on the relationship between language control and domain-general cognitive control.
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