講演会のご案内
Conference: The Neural Basis of Simultaneous Interpretation
By: Dr Alexis Hervais-Adelman, Geneva University (Switzerland)
Département des Neurosciences Cliniques & Faculté de Traduction et d'Interprétation
Place: Waseda University, Waseda Campus, Building 11, 4th floor, Conference Room 1
(http://www.waseda.jp/sils/en/about/office.html)
Date & Time: Thursday 10th, April 2014, from 18h15.
Language: English
Audience: researchers, teachers, students
Contact: Sylvain Detey (detey@waseda.jp)
Outline:
The neural basis of simultaneous interpretation: extreme language control networks overlap with executive control networks.
The multilingual brain is required to continuously select between languages for expression or comprehension. An increasing body of work indicates that this constant demand has profound cognitive consequences, manifest as a bilingual advantage on a range of non-linguistic tasks that tap executive processes [1]. It has been suggested that the advantages observed stem from the need for the bilingual brain to frequently engage in inhibitory control [2]. An alternative hypothesis suggests the involvement of a more general “conflict monitoring system” [3]. Overall, it appears that executive processes and multi-lingual language management depend upon similar executive networks [4], that are implicated in both inhibition and conflict monitoring. In order to further elucidate the brain basis of language control, we examined simultaneous interpretation (SI), a task that places extreme demands on both executive and linguistic control.
SI requires the simultaneous management of speech comprehension and production while also monitoring the accuracy of the interpretation, respecting its phonetic, semantic, syntactic, and prosodic rules [5]. Successful SI depends not just upon mastery of the two languages involved, but also mastery of the executive processes underlying the strategic/coordinated management of relevant cognitive resources. In order to determine the brain basis of SI, we compared the brain regions activated in a group of 50 non-expert multilingual individuals while listening to sentences, shadowing sentences (i.e. simultaneously repeating sentences) and simultaneously interpreting sentences.
Results reveal that SI recruits interacting networks involved in articulation, speech comprehension, translation and executive processes. Importantly, in addition to speech perception and production networks, the SI appears to recruit subcortical structures, including the basal ganglia and thalamus. These structures are known to be heavily implicated in cortico-subcortical executive control networks central to action-initiation, inhibition and response-conflict management. These findings demonstrate the overlapping nature of language control and cognitive control mechanisms.
References:
1 Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. & Luk, G. Bilingualism: consequences for mind and brain. Trends Cogn Sci 16, 240-250, doi:10.1016/j.tics.2012.03.001 (2012).
2 Green, D. Mental control of the bilingual lexico-semantic system. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 1, 67-81 (1998).
3 Hilchey, M. D. & Klein, R. M. Are there bilingual advantages on nonlinguistic interference tasks? Implications for the plasticity of executive control processes. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 18, 625-658, doi:10.3758/s13423-011-0116-7 (2011).
4 Hervais-Adelman, A. G., Moser-Mercer, B. & Golestani, N. Executive control of language in the bilingual brain: integrating the evidence from neuroimaging to neuropsychology. Front Psychol 2, 234, doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00234 (2011).
5 Moser-Mercer, B., Frauenfelder, U. H., Casado, B. & Kunzli, A. in Language processing and simultaneous interpreting: Interdisciplinary perspectives Benjamins Translation Library (eds Birgitta Englund Dimitrova & Kenneth Hyltenstam) 107-132 (John Benjamins, 2000).
