Perceived Communicative Context and Emotional Content Amplify Visual Word Processing in the Fusiform Gyrus

Abstract

The personal significance of a language statement depends on its communicative context. However, this is rarely taken into account in neuroscience studies. Here, we investigate how the implied source of single word statements alters their cortical processing. Participants' brain event-related potentials were recorded in response to identical word streams consisting of positive, negative, and neutral trait adjectives stated to either represent personal trait feedback from a human or to be randomly generated by a computer. Results showed a strong impact of perceived sender. Regardless of content, the notion of receiving feedback from a human enhanced all components, starting with the P2 and encompassing early posterior negativity (EPN), P3, and the late positive potential (LPP). Moreover, negative feedback by the "human sender" elicited a larger EPN, whereas positive feedback generally induced a larger LPP. Source estimations revealed differences between "senders" in visual areas, particularly the bilateral fusiform gyri. Likewise, emotional content enhanced activity in these areas. These results specify how even implied sender identity changes the processing of single words in seemingly realistic communicative settings, amplifying their processing in the visual brain. This suggests that the concept of motivated attention extends from stimulus significance to simultaneous appraisal of contextual relevance. Finally, consistent with distinct stages of emotional processing, at least in contexts perceived as social, humans are initially alerted to negative content, but later process what is perceived as positive feedback more intensely.

Selective visual attention to emotional words: Early parallel frontal and visual activations followed by interactive effects in visual cortex

“…The EPN was significantly more negative for emotional than for neutral words, which is frequently reported [Kissler and Herbert, ; Schacht and Sommer, ; Scott et al, ]. In source space, this effect resulted from increased visual activations for emotional compared to neutral words, largely confirming previous source reconstructions of emotion effects in word processing [Keuper et al, ; Kissler et al, ; Schindler et al, ]. In tendency, in line with previous word processing studies [Kissler et al, ], the EPN was left lateralized and there was also a trend for positive words to elicit a larger EPN than did negative words.…”

“…For significant main and interaction effects, post‐hoc comparisons were calculated to determine the direction of the differences. In line with previous studies, we show statistical differences in source activity of voxels differing at least at an uncorrected threshold of P < 0.005 and a minimum of 25 significant voxels per cluster [Schindler and Kissler, ; Schindler et al, ,b]. Additionally, resulting cluster sizes with an uncorrected threshold of P < 0.001, as well as with a family‐wise error (fwe) corrected threshold of P < 0.05, are displayed in all tables.…”

“…Previous EEG [Sabatinelli et al, ] or MEG [Moratti et al, ] picture processing studies located generators of emotional LPP enhancements in occipito‐parietal [Moratti et al, ; Sabatinelli et al, ; Schupp et al, ] as well as right prefrontal structures [Moratti et al, ]. Here, as well as in our previous studies, localizations of LPP emotion word effects were restricted to occipital structures of the ventral stream, including fusiform regions [Schindler and Kissler, ; Schindler et al, ]. While visual processing enhancement by emotion seems consistent across stimuli and is in line with previous fMRI studies [Beauregard et al, ; Compton, ; Herbert et al, ; Hoffmann et al, ], stimulus‐dependent effects may exist, with complex pictures activating more dorsal stream regions, whereas words and faces may activate more ventral stream regions [Sabatinelli et al, ].…”

“…Partial eta‐squared ( ) was estimated to describe effect sizes, where = 0.02 describes a small, = 0.13 a medium, and = 0.26 a large effect [Cohen, 1988]. Time windows were segmented from 200 to 300 ms to investigate EPN effects [Kissler et al, ] and from 400 to 700 ms to investigate LPP effects [Kissler et al, ; Schindler et al, ]. For the EPN, two symmetrical occipital clusters were examined.…”

Differential effects of face-realism and emotion on event-related brain potentials and their implications for the uncanny valley theory

“…The statistical comparisons used in source space were based on significant differences on the scalp. In line with previous studies394273, we describe statistical differences in source activity of voxels differing at least at an uncorrected threshold of p  < 0.005 and a minimum of twenty-five significant voxels per cluster. Additionally, in all tables results are shown applying a family-wise error corrected threshold of p  < 0.05.…”