An fMRI Study of Reading Different Word Form

Chinese characters appear in the currently used Korean language, and the writing system of the Korean language consists of a mixture of the Korean alphabet and Chinese characters. However, the usage of Chinese characters in Korean language is different compared to Chinese or Japanese. In the present study, the neural mechanisms involved in reading a single Chinese character words and naming pictures by Korean native speakers were investigated using a functional magnetic resonance imaging technique. The findings show a right hemispheric dominance within the occipito-temporal and the left middle / medial frontal area for both reading and naming of Chinese characters and pictures. This should reflect the specific visual processing of reading Chinese characters. Additional activations in inferior frontal and cingulage gyrus are also observed. The activations of inferior parietal region and thalamus are of interest, since we assume that these activations are strongly related with the phonological status of single Chinese character words rather than two character words by Korean native speakers.