One of the earliest and most enjoyable roles for parents is reading or telling stories aloud to their children. Beyond this delightful bonding experience lies a profound skill: reading itself. Literacy is an invaluable ability that empowers individuals to gain knowledge, pursue education, and navigate a multitude of everyday tasks. Consequently, numerous studies in psychology and neuroscience have sought to unravel the brain's intricate mechanisms for deciphering written language.
Recently, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences conducted a comprehensive review of this existing body of research. Their findings, published in the journal Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, offer a broad understanding of the brain regions and processes engaged during various forms of reading.
As Sabrina Turker, Beatrice Fumagalli, and their co-authors noted in their paper, "Literacy provides the key to social contacts, education, and employment, and significantly influences well-being and mental health." Their analysis of previous studies revealed specific areas within the brain's left hemisphere that are uniquely activated when processing letters, words, sentences, and entire texts.
Through their review, the researchers identified general brain regions activated during reading, as well as areas specifically involved in processing different units of text, including individual letters, real words, made-up words, and complete passages. Notably, they found that reading isolated letters primarily activated a single cluster of neurons in the left occipital cortex (OTC), whereas reading words, sentences, and longer texts engaged a wider network of brain regions.
Furthermore, Turker, Fumagalli, and their colleagues discovered distinctions in brain activity depending on whether reading was done aloud (overt reading) or silently (covert reading). For example, reading aloud frequently activates brain areas associated with movement and the processing of sounds.
In conclusion, this review study provides a valuable overview of the neural networks involved in different types of reading. These insights can guide future research aimed at further exploring the specific roles of these brain structures in the development of literacy.
Picture: Bedtime Reading (Gemini)
