More Than Words: Using AI to Map How the Brain Understands Sentences - Neuroscience News

Summary: Combining neuroimaging data with artificial intelligence technology, researchers have identified a complex network within the brain that comprehends the meaning of spoken sentences. Have you ever wondered why you are able to hear a sentence and understand its meaning – given that the same words in a different order would have an entirely different meaning? New research involving neuroimaging and A.I., describes the complex network within the brain that comprehends the meaning of a spoken sentence. "It has been unclear whether the integration of this meaning is represented in a particular site in the brain, such as the anterior temporal lobes, or reflects a more network level operation that engages multiple brain regions," said Andrew Anderson, Ph.D., research assistant professor in the University of Rochester Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience and lead author on of the study which was published in the Journal of Neuroscience. "The meaning of a sentence is more than the sum of its parts. Take a very simple example – 'the car ran over the cat' and'the cat ran over the car' – each sentence has exactly the same words, but those words have a totally different meaning when reordered."