Ventral and dorsal fronto-parietal fiber pathways for phonological transformation processes

Objectives: Aim of this study was to track fronto-parietal white-matter pathways within a large-scale language network which was functionally defined by an fMRI experiment investigating two different phonological transformation processes. In suprasegmental transformation, a shift of stress placement was required in transforming a pseudo-country into a pseudo-language, or vice-versa (e.g. “Dóga“->“Dogánisch“). In segmental transformation, in turn, a vowel segment change was elicited by having subjects transform a pseudo-noun into a pseudo-diminutive, or vice-versa (e.g. “der Mall“->“das Mällchen“). Methods: DTI w…