ArticleScientific reports2019
Visual cortex recruitment during language processing in blind individuals is explained by Hebbian learning.
Article in Scientific reports, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers.
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Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed.
- A brain-constrained neural model of cognition and language with NEST: transitioning from the Felix framework.Cognitive neurodynamics · 2026Article
- What is so hard about abstract words, anyways? A neuromechanistic explanation using brain-constrained neural network models.Cognitive neurodynamics · 2026Article
- Article
- From Spontaneous Ignitions to Sensorimotor Cell Assemblies via Dopamine: A Spiking Neurocomputational Model of Infants' Hand Action Acquisition.Brain sciences · 2026Article
- From cortical and white matter structure to meaning: a brain-constrained neural network of semantic grounding in action and perception.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2026Article
- From Touch to Mental Imagery: The Embodied Aesthetic Experience of Late-Blind People Engaged in the Tactile Exploration of Enrico Castellani's Pseudo-Braille Surface.Culture, medicine and psychiatry · 2025Article
- On the ability of standard and brain-constrained deep neural networks to support cognitive superposition: a position paper.Cognitive neurodynamics · 2024Article
- Distributed representations of prediction error signals across the cortical hierarchy are synergistic.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Breakdown of category-specific word representations in a brain-constrained neurocomputational model of semantic dementia.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Neurobiological mechanisms for language, symbols and concepts: Clues from brain-constrained deep neural networks.Progress in neurobiology · 2023Review
- Brain-constrained neural modeling explains fast mapping of words to meaning.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2023Article
- Influence of language on perception and concept formation in a brain-constrained deep neural network model.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Time-varying connectivity of the precuneus and its association with cognition and depressive symptoms in neuromyelitis optica: A pilot MRI study.Multiple sclerosis (Houndmills, Basingstoke, England) · 2022Article
- Modelling concrete and abstract concepts using brain-constrained deep neural networks.Psychological research · 2022Article
- Instantaneous neural processing of communicative functions conveyed by speech prosody.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2022Article
- Biological constraints on neural network models of cognitive function.Nature reviews. Neuroscience · 2021Review
- A sensitive period in the neural phenotype of language in blind individuals.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2020Article
- Crossmodal Language Grounding in an Embodied Neurocognitive Model.Frontiers in neurorobotics · 2020Article
- Perceptual Function and Category-Selective Neural Organization in Children with Resections of Visual Cortex.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2019Article
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4 authors.
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Abstract
In blind people, the visual cortex takes on higher cognitive functions, including language. Why this functional reorganisation mechanistically emerges at the neuronal circuit level is still unclear. Here, we use a biologically constrained network model implementing features of anatomical structure, neurophysiological function and connectivity of fronto-temporal-occipital areas to simulate word-meaning acquisition in visually deprived and undeprived brains. We observed that, only under visual deprivation, distributed word-related neural circuits 'grew into' the deprived visual areas, which therefore adopted a linguistic-semantic role. Three factors are crucial for explaining this deprivation-related growth: changes in the network's activity balance brought about by the absence of uncorrelated sensory input, the connectivity structure of the network, and Hebbian correlation learning. In addition, the blind model revealed long-lasting spiking neural activity compared to the sighted model during word recognition, which is a neural correlate of enhanced verbal working memory. The present neurocomputational model offers a neurobiological account for neural changes following sensory deprivation, thus closing the gap between cellular-level mechanisms, system-level linguistic and semantic function.
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