TY - JOUR
T1 - Pronouns reactivate conceptual representations in human hippocampal neurons
AU - Dijksterhuis, D. E.
AU - Self, M. W.
AU - Possel, J. K.
AU - Peters, J. C.
AU - van Straaten, E. C.W.
AU - Idema, S.
AU - Baaijen, J. C.
AU - van der Salm, S. M.A.
AU - Aarnoutse, E. J.
AU - van Klink, N. C.E.
AU - van Eijsden, P.
AU - Hanslmayr, S.
AU - Chelvarajah, R.
AU - Roux, F.
AU - Kolibius, L. D.
AU - Sawlani, V.
AU - Rollings, D. T.
AU - Dehaene, S.
AU - Roelfsema, P. R.
PY - 2024/9/27
Y1 - 2024/9/27
N2 - During discourse comprehension, every new word adds to an evolving representation of meaning that accumulates over consecutive sentences and constrains the next words. To minimize repetition and utterance length, languages use pronouns, like the word "she," to refer to nouns and phrases that were previously introduced. It has been suggested that language comprehension requires that pronouns activate the same neuronal representations as the nouns themselves. We recorded from individual neurons in the human hippocampus during a reading task. Cells that were selective to a particular noun were later reactivated by pronouns that refer to the cells' preferred noun. These results imply that concept cells contribute to a rapid and dynamic semantic memory network that is recruited during language comprehension.
AB - During discourse comprehension, every new word adds to an evolving representation of meaning that accumulates over consecutive sentences and constrains the next words. To minimize repetition and utterance length, languages use pronouns, like the word "she," to refer to nouns and phrases that were previously introduced. It has been suggested that language comprehension requires that pronouns activate the same neuronal representations as the nouns themselves. We recorded from individual neurons in the human hippocampus during a reading task. Cells that were selective to a particular noun were later reactivated by pronouns that refer to the cells' preferred noun. These results imply that concept cells contribute to a rapid and dynamic semantic memory network that is recruited during language comprehension.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85205152066&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1126/science.adr2813
DO - 10.1126/science.adr2813
M3 - Article
C2 - 39325896
AN - SCOPUS:85205152066
VL - 385
SP - 1478
EP - 1484
JO - Science (New York, N.Y.)
JF - Science (New York, N.Y.)
IS - 6716
ER -