Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Biological abnormality of impaired reading is constrained by culture

Nature volume 431, pages 71–76 (2004)Cite this article

Abstract

Developmental dyslexia is characterized by a severe reading problem in people who have normal intelligence and schooling1,2,3. Impaired reading of alphabetic scripts is associated with dysfunction of left temporoparietal brain regions2,3,4,5. These regions perform phonemic analysis and conversion of written symbols to phonological units of speech (grapheme-to-phoneme conversion); two central cognitive processes that mediate reading acquisition6,7. Furthermore, it has been assumed that, in contrast to cultural diversities, dyslexia in different languages has a universal biological origin1,8. Here we show using functional magnetic resonance imaging with reading-impaired Chinese children and associated controls, that functional disruption of the left middle frontal gyrus is associated with impaired reading of the Chinese language (a logographic rather than alphabetic writing system). Reading impairment in Chinese is manifested by two deficits: one relating to the conversion of graphic form (orthography) to syllable, and the other concerning orthography-to-semantics mapping. Both of these processes are critically mediated by the left middle frontal gyrus, which functions as a centre for fluent Chinese reading9,10,11 that coordinates and integrates various information about written characters in verbal and spatial working memory. This finding provides an insight into the fundamental pathophysiology of dyslexia by suggesting that rather than having a universal origin, the biological abnormality of impaired reading is dependent on culture.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Get just this article for as long as you need it

$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Examples of experimental materials and behavioural results.
Figure 2: Brain regions with significant activity during phonological processing and orthography-to-phonology mapping.
Figure 3: Brain regions with significant activity during orthography-to-semantics mapping.

References

  1. Eden, G. & Moats, L. The role of neuroscience in the remediation of students with dyslexia. Nature Neurosci. 5, 1080–1084 (2002)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Horwitz, B., Rumsey, J. M. & Donohue, B. C. Functional connectivity of the angular gyrus in normal reading and dyslexia. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 95, 8939–8944 (1998)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Temple, E. et al. Neural deficits in children with dyslexia ameliorated by behavioral remediation: Evidence from functional MRI. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 100, 2860–2865 (2003)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Shaywitz, S. E. et al. Functional disruption in the organization of the brain for reading in dyslexia. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 95, 2636–2641 (1998)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Aylward, E. H. et al. Instructional treatment associated with changes in brain activation in children with dyslexia. Neurology 61, 212–219 (2003)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Turkeltaub, P. E., Gareau, L., Flowers, D. L., Zeffiro, T. & Eden, G. Development of neural mechanisms for reading. Nature Neurosci. 6, 767–773 (2003)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Rayner, K., Foorman, B. R., Perfetti, C. A., Pesetsky, D. & Seidenberg, M. S. How psychological science informs the teaching of reading. Psychol. Sci. Publ. Interest 2, 31–74 (2001)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Paulesu, E. et al. Dyslexia: cultural diversity and biological unity. Science 291, 2165–2167 (2001)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Tan, L. H. et al. The neural system underlying Chinese logograph reading. Neuroimage 13, 836–846 (2001)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Tan, L. H. et al. Neural systems of second language reading are shaped by native language. Hum. Brain Mapp. 18, 158–166 (2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Siok, W. T., Jin, Z., Fletcher, P. & Tan, L. H. Distinct brain regions associated with syllable and phoneme. Hum. Brain Mapp. 18, 201–207 (2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Mattingly, I. G. in Language by Ear and by Eye: The Relationships Between Speech and Reading (eds Kavanagh, J. F. & Mattingly, I. G.) 133–147 (MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1972)

    Google Scholar 

  13. Wang, W. S.-Y. The Chinese language. Sci. Am. 228, 50–62 (1973)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Perfetti, C. A. & Tan, L. H. in Reading Chinese Script: A Cognitive Analysis (eds Wang, J., Inhoff, A. W. & Chen, I.) 115–134 (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, New Jersey, 1999)

    Google Scholar 

  15. Perfetti, C. A., Liu, Y. & Tan, L. H. The lexical constituency model: Some implications of research on Chinese for general theories of reading. Psychol. Rev. (in the press)

  16. Price, C. J., More, C. J., Humphreys, G. W. & Wise, R. S. J. Segregating semantic from phonological processes during reading. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 9, 727–733 (1997)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  17. Gabrieli, J. D., Poldrack, R. A. & Desmond, J. E. The role of left prefrontal cortex in language and memory. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 95, 906–913 (1998)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  18. Courtney, S. M., Petit, L., Maisog, J. M., Ungerleider, L. G. & Haxby, J. V. An area specialized for spatial working memory in human frontal cortex. Science 279, 1347–1351 (1998)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. D'Esposito, M. et al. The neural basis of the central executive system of working memory. Nature 378, 279–281 (1995)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  20. Petrides, M., Alivisatos, B., Meyer, E. & Evans, A. C. Functional activation of the human frontal cortex during the performance of verbal working memory tasks. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 90, 878–882 (1993)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  21. Cohen, L. et al. The visual word form area: spatial and temporal characterization of an initial stage of reading in normal subjects and posterior split-brain patients. Brain 123, 291–307 (2000)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Tan, L. H. et al. Brain activation in the processing of Chinese characters and words: A functional MRI study. Hum. Brain Mapp. 10, 16–27 (2000)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  23. Gold, B. T. & Buckner, R. L. Common prefrontal regions coactivate with dissociable posterior regions during controlled semantic and phonological tasks. Neuron 35, 803–812 (2002)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. Wagner, A. D., Pare-Blagoev, J. E., Clark, J. & Poldrack, R. A. Recovering meaning: left prefrontal cortex guides controlled semantic retrieval. Neuron 31, 329–338 (2001)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  25. Fu, S., Chen, Y., Smith, S., Iversen, S. & Matthews, P. M. Effects of word form on brain processing of written Chinese. Neuroimage 17, 1538–1548 (2002)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Fiez, J. A. Sound and meaning: how native language affects reading strategies. Nature Neurosci. 3, 3–5 (2000)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  27. Kochunov, P. et al. Localized morphological brain differences between English speaking Caucasian and Chinese speaking Asian populations: New evidence of anatomical plasticity. Neuroreport 14, 961–964 (2003)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  28. Siok, W. T. & Fletcher, P. The role of phonological awareness and visual-orthographic skills in Chinese reading acquisition. Dev. Psychol. 36, 887–899 (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  29. Snyder, P. J. & Harris, L. J. Handedness, sex, and familial sinistrality effects on spatial tasks. Cortex 29, 115–134 (1993)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  30. Talairach, J. & Tournoux, P. Co-planar Stereotaxic Atlas of the Human Brain (Thieme Medical Publishers, New York, 1988)

    Google Scholar 

  31. Fox, P. T. et al. A PET study of the neural system of stuttering. Nature 382, 158–161 (1996)

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by a Hong Kong Government RGC Central Allocation grant, and by the Intramural Research Program of NIMH. We thank J. Gabrieli, R. Desimone, C. K. Leong, K. K. Luke, S. Matthews and J. Spinks for support and comments.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, Department of Linguistics, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

    Wai Ting Siok & Li Hai Tan

  2. Learning Research and Development Center, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 15260, USA

    Charles A. Perfetti

  3. MRI Division, Beijing 306 Hospital, 100101, Beijing, China

    Zhen Jin

  4. Laboratory of Neuropsychology, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, Maryland, 20892, USA

    Li Hai Tan

Authors
  1. Wai Ting Siok
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Charles A. Perfetti
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Zhen Jin
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Li Hai Tan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Li Hai Tan.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing financial interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Siok, W., Perfetti, C., Jin, Z. et al. Biological abnormality of impaired reading is constrained by culture. Nature 431, 71–76 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature02865

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature02865

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing