Anodal transcranial direct current stimulation over left inferior frontal gyrus enhances sentence comprehension

[Display omitted] •Single session tDCS may interfere with cognitive functions in healthy participants.•a-tDCS over LIFG improves comprehension of simple and complex sentences.•Behavioral rehabilitation of linguistic comprehension may be boosted with a-tDCS. We tested the possibility of enhancing nat...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Brain and language 2018-01, Vol.176, p.36-41
Main Authors: Giustolisi, Beatrice, Vergallito, Alessandra, Cecchetto, Carlo, Varoli, Erica, Romero Lauro, Leonor J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Acoustic Stimulation - methods
Cognitive science
Comprehension - physiology
Electrodes
Female
Humans
Language
Language Tests
Left inferior frontal gyrus
Linguistics
Male
Memory, Short-Term - physiology
Photic Stimulation - methods
Prefrontal Cortex - physiology
Sentence comprehension
tDCS
Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation - methods
Verbal short-term memory
Young Adult
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Summary:[Display omitted] •Single session tDCS may interfere with cognitive functions in healthy participants.•a-tDCS over LIFG improves comprehension of simple and complex sentences.•Behavioral rehabilitation of linguistic comprehension may be boosted with a-tDCS. We tested the possibility of enhancing natural language comprehension through the application of anodal tDCS (a-tDCS) over the left inferior frontal gyrus, a key region for verbal short-term memory and language comprehension. We designed a between subjects sham- and task-controlled study. During tDCS stimulation, participants performed a sentence to picture matching task in which targets were sentences with different load on short-term memory. Regardless of load on short-term memory, the Anodal group performed significantly better than the Sham group, thus providing evidence that a-tDCS over LIFG enhances natural language comprehension. To our knowledge, we apply for the first time tDCS to boost sentence comprehension. This result is of special interest also from a clinical perspective: applying a-tDCS in patients manifesting problems at the sentence level due to brain damage could enhance the effects of behavioral rehabilitation procedures aimed to improve language comprehension.
ISSN:0093-934X
1090-2155
DOI:10.1016/j.bandl.2017.11.001