ArticleCerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991)2023
No evidence of theory of mind reasoning in the human language network.
Article in Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991), 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 33 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
33 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 44 citations in OpenAlex.
- Non-literal language processing is jointly supported by the language and theory of mind networks: Evidence from a novel meta-analytic fMRI approach.Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior · 2023Pooled it
- Preserved topography, lateralization, selectivity, and functional connectivity of the language network in older brains.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Domain-general and language-specific brain networks are differentially associated with verbal intelligence during development.iScience · 2026Article
- A language network in the individualized functional connectomes of 1199 human brains doing arbitrary tasks.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Selectivity for high-level language processing is highly localized in individual brains.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Monosynaptic connections link functionally similar regions in human cortex.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Precision fMRI reveals that the language network exhibits adult-like left-hemispheric lateralization by 4 years of age.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Functional dissociation of language and theory of mind in the developing superior temporal lobe.Communications biology · 2026Article
- Article
- The Intriguingly Social N400 of Preverbal Infants.Developmental neurobiology · 2026Article
- Human brain network for reading the mind from the eyes: beyond activated and deactivated regions.Social cognitive and affective neuroscience · 2026Article
- Article
- The cerebellar components of the human language network.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Precision fMRI reveals that the language network exhibits adult-like left-hemispheric lateralization by 4 years of age.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- A two-dimensional space of linguistic representations shared across individuals.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Constructed languages are processed by the same brain mechanisms as natural languages.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study of Phrase Structure and Subject Island Violations.Journal of cognitive neuroscience · 2025Article
- Constructed languages are processed by the same brain mechanisms as natural languages.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- An fMRI study of phrase structure and subject island violations.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- Linguistic inputs must be syntactically parsable to fully engage the language network.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Language comprehension and the ability to infer others' thoughts (theory of mind [ToM]) are interrelated during development and language use. However, neural evidence that bears on the relationship between language and ToM mechanisms is mixed. Although robust dissociations have been reported in brain disorders, brain activations for contrasts that target language and ToM bear similarities, and some have reported overlap. We take another look at the language-ToM relationship by evaluating the response of the language network, as measured with fMRI, to verbal and nonverbal ToM across 151 participants. Individual-participant analyses reveal that all core language regions respond more strongly when participants read vignettes about false beliefs compared to the control vignettes. However, we show that these differences are largely due to linguistic confounds, and no such effects appear in a nonverbal ToM task. These results argue against cognitive and neural overlap between language processing and ToM. In exploratory analyses, we find responses to social processing in the "periphery" of the language network-right-hemisphere homotopes of core language areas and areas in bilateral angular gyri-but these responses are not selectively ToM-related and may reflect general visual semantic processing.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.