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Conserved Sequence Processing in Primate Frontal Cortex.

Published version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

Change log

Authors

Wilson, Benjamin 
Marslen-Wilson, William D 
Petkov, Christopher I 

Abstract

An important aspect of animal perception and cognition is learning to recognize relationships between environmental events that predict others in time, a form of relational knowledge that can be assessed using sequence-learning paradigms. Humans are exquisitely sensitive to sequencing relationships, and their combinatorial capacities, most saliently in the domain of language, are unparalleled. Recent comparative research in human and nonhuman primates has obtained behavioral and neuroimaging evidence for evolutionarily conserved substrates involved in sequence processing. The findings carry implications for the origins of domain-general capacities underlying core language functions in humans. Here, we synthesize this research into a 'ventrodorsal gradient' model, where frontal cortex engagement along this axis depends on sequencing complexity, mapping onto the sequencing capacities of different species.

Description

Keywords

cognition, evolution, human, language, monkey, neurobiology, Animals, Biological Evolution, Cognition, Conserved Sequence, Frontal Lobe, Humans, Language, Learning

Journal Title

Trends Neurosci

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

0166-2236
1878-108X

Volume Title

40

Publisher

Elsevier BV
Sponsorship
European Research Council (230570)
Medical Research Council (MC_U105580454)