Biomedical subjects

Bertram Opitz

Publications and source records attributed to Bertram Opitz.

8 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

BA 44 in Broca's area supports syntactic gender decisions in language production.

The involvement of Broca's area in syntactic gender processing has been shown for metalinguistic decisions in language comprehension and for natural speech production. These studies, however, are not directly comparable owing to the different methods used. The present functional magnetic resonance imaging study investigated gender processing during language production with metalinguistic decisions instead of natural production. Participants saw pictures of real objects and made gender decisions (GEN) about the picture names. Activation was compared with nonlinguistic decisions about geometrical objects (BASE). Broca's area was activated in the contrast GEN > BASE. Using cytoarchitectonic probability maps, the activation was localized at Brodmann's area 44. The data suggest that Brodmann's area 44 in Broca's area is a shared neural correlate for gender processing in production and comprehension.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Differential hippocampal and prefrontal-striatal contributions to instance-based and rule-based learning.

It is a topic of current interest whether learning in humans relies on the acquisition of abstract rule knowledge (rule-based learning) or whether it depends on superficial item-specific information (instance-based learning). Here, we identified brain regions that mediate either of the two learning mechanisms by combining fMRI with an experimental protocol shown to be able to dissociate both learning mechanisms. Subjects had to learn object-position conjunctions in several trials and blocks. In a learning condition, either objects (Experiment 1) or positions (Experiment 2) were held constant within-blocks. In contrast to a control condition in which object-position conjunctions were trial-unique, a performance increase within and across-blocks was observed in the learning condition of both experiments. We hypothesized that within-block learning mainly relies on instance-based processes, whereas across-block learning might depend on rule-based mechanisms. A within-block parametric fMRI analysis revealed a learning-related increase of lateral prefrontal and striatal activity and a learning-related decrease of hippocampal activity in both experiments. By contrast, across-block learning was associated with an activation modulation in distinct prefrontal-striatal brain regions, but not in the hippocampus. These data indicate that hippocampal and prefrontal-striatal brain regions differentially contribute to instance-based and rule-based learning.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Contribution of familiarity and recollection to associative recognition memory: insights from event-related potentials.

Within the dual-process perspective of recognition memory, it has been claimed that familiarity is sufficient to support recognition of single items, but recollection is necessary for associative recognition of item pairs. However, there are some reports suggesting that familiarity might support associative recognition judgments when the items form an easy to access bound representation. In contrast, recollection seems to be required for the recognition of bindings that might be flexibly rearranged in novel situations. We investigated whether both forms of binding are mediated by different mechanisms as reflected by a qualitatively different spatiotemporal eventrelated potential (ERP) pattern. In a recognition memory experiment, subjects gave old/new judgments to words learned by focusing either on interitem associations or on size relation of word triplets. Results revealed higher hit rates in the relational condition as compared to the associative condition. In addition, the proportion of triplets from which all three items were remembered was significantly larger in the relational condition suggesting that memory retrieval in this condition relies primarily on bound representations of word triplets. The ERP revealed a late parietal old/new effect for both conditions, with relational processing resulting in a greater effect. In contrast, an early frontal old/new effect was solely present in the associative condition. Taken together, these data provide evidence that familiarity might support associative recognition if the associated components are coherently encoded into a bound representation. Recollection might foster the recognition of relational bindings among items. This indicates that the contribution of familiarity and recollection to associative recognition depends on the kind of binding operations performed on the items rather than on the single versus multiple item distinction.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Prefrontal-hippocampal dynamics involved in learning regularities across episodes.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, the neural correlates of context-specific memories and invariant memories about regularities across episodes were investigated. Volunteers had to learn conjunctions between objects and positions. In an invariant learning condition, positions were held constant, enabling subjects to learn regularities across trials. By contrast, in a context-specific condition object-position conjunctions were trial unique. Performance increase in the invariant learning condition was paralleled by a learning-related increase of inferior frontal gyrus activation and ventral striatal activation and a decrease of hippocampus activation. Conversely, in the context-specific condition hippocampal activation was constant across trials. We argue that the learning-related hippocampal activation pattern might be due to reduced relational binding requirements once regularities are extracted. Furthermore, we propose that the learning-related prefrontal modulation reflects the requirement to extract and maintain regularities across trials and the adjustment of object-position conjunctions on the basis of the extracted knowledge. Finally, our data suggest that the ventral striatum encodes the increased predictability of spatial features as a function of learning. Taken together, these results indicate a transition of the relative roles of distinct brain regions during learning regularities across multiple episodes: regularity learning is characterized by a shift from a hippocampal to a prefrontal-striatal brain system.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Brain correlates of language learning: the neuronal dissociation of rule-based versus similarity-based learning.

Language learning is one of the mysteries of human cognition. One of the crucial questions is the following: Does acquisition of grammatical knowledge depend primarily on abstract rules or on item-specific information? Although there is evidence that both mechanisms contribute to language acquisition, their relative importance during the process of language learning is unknown. Using an artificial grammar paradigm, we show by means of functional magnetic resonance imaging that the brain dissociates the two mechanisms: the left anterior hippocampus supports similarity-based learning, whereas the left ventral premotor cortex is selectively engaged by abstract rule processing. Moreover, data analysis over time on learning suggests that similarity-based learning plays a nonobligatory role during the initial phase, and that rule-based abstraction plays a crucial role during later learning.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Interactions of the hippocampal system and the prefrontal cortex in learning language-like rules.

One of the most influential views on the hippocampal function suggests that this brain region is critically involved in relational memory processing, that is, binding converging inputs to mediate the representation of relationships among the constituents of episodes. It has been proposed that this binding is automatic and obligatory during learning and remembering In addition, neuroimaging studies have highlighted the importance of the prefrontal cortex, in learning, memory, and language processing. However, the posited importance of hippocampal-prefrontal interaction remains to be empirically tested. In the present study we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine in detail this interaction by assessing learning-related changes in hemodynamic activity during artificial language acquisition. It has been shown previously that artificial grammar systems might be learned by evaluating pattern-based relations in word sequences and generalizing beyond specific word order, that is, rule abstraction. During scanning, participants learned an artificial language whose miniature grammar meets the universal principles of a natural language. Increased proficiency level of the artificial language is associated with decreased left hippocampal activity. In contrast, we observed an increased recruitment of the left inferior frontal gyrus (Broca's area), a region that contributes to syntax processing in natural language. The present results, therefore, indicate a learning-related change in brain circuitry underlying relational processes of language learning, with a transition from a similarity-based learning system in the medial temporal lobes to a language-related processing system in the left prefrontal cortex.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Prefrontal cortex involvement in preattentive auditory deviance detection: neuroimaging and electrophysiological evidence.

Previous electrophysiological and neuroimaging studies suggest that the mismatch negativity (MMN) is generated by a temporofrontal network subserving preattentive auditory change detection. In two experiments we employed event-related brain potentials (ERP) and event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine neural and hemodynamic activity related to deviance processing, using three types of deviant tones (small, medium, and large) in both a pitch and a space condition. In the pitch condition, hemodynamic activity in the right superior temporal gyrus (STG) increased as a function of deviance. Comparisons between small and medium and between small and large deviants revealed right prefrontal activation in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG; BA 44/45) and middle frontal gyrus (MFG; BA 46), whereas large relative to medium deviants led to left and right IFG (BA 44/45) activation. In the ERP experiment the amplitude of the early MMN (90-120 ms) increased as a function of deviance, by this paralleling the right STG activation in the fMRI experiment. A U-shaped relationship between MMN amplitude and the degree of deviance was observed in a late time window (140-170 ms) resembling the right IFG activation pattern. In a subsequent source analysis constrained by fMRI activation foci, early and late MMN activity could be modeled by dipoles placed in the STG and IFG, respectively. In the spatial condition no reliable hemodynamic activation could be observed. The MMN amplitude was substantially smaller than in the pitch condition for all three spatial deviants in the ERP experiment. In contrast to the pitch condition it increased as a function of deviance in the early and in the late time window. We argue that the right IFG mediates auditory deviance detection in case of low discriminability between a sensory memory trace and auditory input. This prefrontal mechanism might be part of top-down modulation of the deviance detection system in the STG.

Acoustic Stimulation↗

PubMed2002

Differential contribution of frontal and temporal cortices to auditory change detection: fMRI and ERP results.

The present study addresses the functional role of the temporal and frontal lobes in auditory change detection. Prior event-related potential (ERP) research suggested that the mismatch negativity (MMN) reflects the involvement of a temporofrontal network subserving auditory change detection processes and the initiation of an involuntary attention switch. In the present study participants were presented with repetitive spectrally rich sounds. Infrequent changes of either small (10% change), medium (30% change), or large (100% change) magnitude were embedded in the stimulus train. ERPs and fMRI measures were obtained in the same subjects in subsequent sessions. Significant hemodynamic activation in the superior temporal gyri (STG) bilaterally and the opercular part of the right inferior frontal gyrus was observed for large and medium deviants only. ERPs showed that small deviants elicited MMN when presented in silence but not when presented with recorded MR background noise, indicating that small deviants were hardly detected under fMRI conditions. The MR signal change in temporal lobe regions was larger for large than for medium deviants. For the right fronto-opercular cortex the opposite pattern was observed. The strength of the temporal activation correlated with the amplitude of the change-related ERP at around 110 ms from stimulus onset while the frontal activation correlated with the change-related ERP at around 150 ms. These results suggest that the right fronto-opercular cortex is part of the neural network generating the MMN. Three alternative explanations of these findings are discussed.

Adult↗