Unifying Monitoring Models of Verbal Monitoring.

Descripción del proyecto

Un modelo de monitorización verbal

Los errores en el habla pueden identificarse mediante mecanismos de monitorización verbal. Cualquier déficit en este ámbito puede provocar patologías como la tartamudez. Por desgracia, existen muchas lagunas sobre los fundamentos de los mecanismos de monitorización verbal. El proyecto financiado con fondos europeos UMMs conectará el mapa de conexiones encefálicas neuronales funcional y estructural con medidas del comportamiento a través de grandes grupos de control a fin de comprobar la producción del lenguaje y el desempeño de distintas tareas de control cognitivo. Su intención es establecer relaciones entre la competencia verbal y los distintos modelos de monitorización, el control cognitivo y las capacidades de monitorización verbal, y los procesos de monitorización verbal en la percepción. El modelo nuevo se validará mediante estimulación magnética transcraneal.

Objetivo

Everyone makes mistakes during speech production. However, to facilitate communication, it is important to limit errors during production (e.g. selecting the wrong word but also disfluencies such as ‘ums’ and stuttering), and to identify errors while listening. This is achieved by applying monitoring mechanisms. Deficits in verbal monitoring mechanisms are linked to severe pathologies, such as stuttering, aphasia and hearing voices. Currently, there are a number of theories that explain part of the mechanisms of verbal monitoring. Despite its central role in language processing, astonishingly, no full account exists. Contemporary verbal monitoring models differ widely with respect to some fundamental properties, indicating significant knowledge gaps. This research project fills in these theoretical gaps by relating the functional brain connectome and structural brain connectome with behavioural measures. We exploit the individual variability of a large cohort of healthy adult individuals, by testing groups on the two extremes of performance on cognitive control tasks, and on two extremes of language production tasks. In four work packages, we investigate the neurobiological and behavioural underpinnings of verbal monitoring in healthy adults. The proposal clarifies 1) if a relationship exists between production competence and monitoring (as per production models of monitoring) and 2) if measures of cognitive control are related to verbal monitoring skills (as per conflict models of monitoring) and 3) the involvement of these processes verbal monitoring in perception. To reach this goal we relate the functional brain connectome and structural brain connectome with behavioural measures. The output of 1-3 is used to inform a new model of verbal monitoring. As a final step, the new model is validated by applying TMS to critical cortical components of the model. The proposed project will constitute major progress in our understanding of the verbal monitoring mechanism.