The cortical substrates of typical reading have been extensively investigated. However, the functional contributions of subcortical regions to reading remain poorly understood and are largely absent from current neuroanatomical models. In the present fMRI study, we analyzed three datasets to test whether specific hippocampal subregions (head, body, and tail) contribute to reading through distinct patterns of activation and functional connectivity.
Results across all datasets revealed that reading was associated with left-lateralized hippocampal activation, with the hippocampal body typically more engaged than either the hippocampal head or tail. Regarding functional connectivity, the left hippocampal head and body showed a stronger coactivation with the ventral (as opposed to the dorsal) reading network in all datasets, suggesting a role in semantic (rather than phonological) processing. Altogether, our study reveals the involvement of the left hippocampus and, in particular, of the hippocampal body during typical reading, confirming the need to incorporate subcortical regions into current language-network models.
Moreover, the connectivity of the left hippocampus to the ventral reading stream provides initial evidence suggesting that the hippocampus contributes to semantic reading processes. The authors would like to thank Caroline Handley for her proofreading and helpful comments. A.G.-A. was supported by grants from the Spanish Ministry of Science (IJC2020-042904-I, MCIN/AEI/https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033), the European Commission (MSCA-PF-EF 101103842), and the Gipuzkoa Provincial Council (G20988929).
W. was supported by grants from the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of Beijing Language and Culture University (25CXTD01). P-A. was supported by grants from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (PID2024-159163NB-I00). BCBL acknowledges funding from the Basque Government through the BERC 2026–2029 program and by the Spanish State CEX2020-001010/AEI/https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033-001010-S.
Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language, 20009, Donostia, San Sebastián, Gipuzkoa, Spain Ane Gurtubay-Antolin, Dalila Merhej & Pedro M. Paz-Alonso IKERBASQUE, Basque Foundation for Science, Bilbo, Spain Ane Gurtubay-Antolin & Pedro M. Paz-Alonso School of Cognitive Science and Allied Health, Beijing Language and Culture University, Beijing, China Key Laboratory of Cognitive Science of Language (Ministry of Education), Beijing Language and Culture University, Beijing, China Center for the Cognitive Science of Language, Beijing Language and Culture University, 100190, Beijing, China Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, China Correspondence to Ane Gurtubay-Antolin, Yanjun Wei or Pedro M.
The authors declare no competing interests. This study was approved by the local ethics committee at the Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language. Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
