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        <title>Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience | New and Recent Articles</title>
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        <description>RSS Feed for Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience | New and Recent Articles</description>
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        <pubDate>2026-05-12T08:14:20.110+00:00</pubDate>
        <ttl>60</ttl>
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        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2013.00001</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2013.00001</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Neurobiology of human language and its evolution: primate and non-primate perspectives]]></title>
        <pubdate>2013-01-28T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Editorial</category>
        <author>Constance Scharff</author><author>Angela D. Friederici</author><author>Michael Petrides</author>
        <description></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00014</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00014</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Birdsong: Is It Music to Their Ears?]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-11-28T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Sarah E. Earp</author><author>Donna L. Maney</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Since the time of Darwin, biologists have wondered whether birdsong and music may serve similar purposes or have the same evolutionary precursors. Most attempts to compare song with music have focused on the qualities of the sounds themselves, such as melody and rhythm. Song is a signal, however, and as such its meaning is tied inextricably to the response of the receiver. Imaging studies in humans have revealed that hearing music induces neural responses in the mesolimbic reward pathway. In this study, we tested whether the homologous pathway responds in songbirds exposed to conspecific song. We played male song to laboratory-housed white-throated sparrows, and immunolabeled the immediate early gene product Egr-1 in each region of the reward pathway that has a clear or putative homologue in humans. We found that the responses, and how well they mirrored those of humans listening to music, depended on sex and endocrine state. In females with breeding-typical plasma levels of estradiol, all of the regions of the mesolimbic reward pathway that respond to music in humans responded to song. In males, we saw responses in the amygdala but not the nucleus accumbens – similar to the pattern reported in humans listening to unpleasant music. The shared responses in the evolutionarily ancient mesolimbic reward system suggest that birdsong and music engage the same neuroaffective mechanisms in the intended listeners.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00013</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00013</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Life History Theory and Social Psychology]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-09-03T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>General Commentary</category>
        <author>Donald F. Sacco</author><author>Karol Osipowicz</author>
        <description></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00012</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00012</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Birds, primates, and spoken language origins: behavioral phenotypes and neurobiological substrates]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-08-16T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Review</category>
        <author>Christopher I. Petkov</author><author>Erich D. Jarvis</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Vocal learners such as humans and songbirds can learn to produce elaborate patterns of structurally organized vocalizations, whereas many other vertebrates such as non-human primates and most other bird groups either cannot or do so to a very limited degree. To explain the similarities among humans and vocal-learning birds and the differences with other species, various theories have been proposed. One set of theories are motor theories, which underscore the role of the motor system as an evolutionary substrate for vocal production learning. For instance, the motor theory of speech and song perception proposes enhanced auditory perceptual learning of speech in humans and song in birds, which suggests a considerable level of neurobiological specialization. Another, a motor theory of vocal learning origin, proposes that the brain pathways that control the learning and production of song and speech were derived from adjacent motor brain pathways. Another set of theories are cognitive theories, which address the interface between cognition and the auditory-vocal domains to support language learning in humans. Here we critically review the behavioral and neurobiological evidence for parallels and differences between the so-called vocal learners and vocal non-learners in the context of motor and cognitive theories. In doing so, we note that behaviorally vocal-production learning abilities are more distributed than categorical, as are the auditory-learning abilities of animals. We propose testable hypotheses on the extent of the specializations and cross-species correspondences suggested by motor and cognitive theories. We believe that determining how spoken language evolved is likely to become clearer with concerted efforts in testing comparative data from many non-human animal species.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00011</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00011</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Is dorsal anterior cingulate cortex activation in response to social exclusion due to expectancy violation? An fMRI study]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-07-27T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Taishi Kawamoto</author><author>Keiichi Onoda</author><author>Ken'ichiro Nakashima</author><author>Hiroshi Nittono</author><author>Shuhei Yamaguchi</author><author>Mitsuhiro Ura</author>
        <description><![CDATA[People are typically quite sensitive about being accepted or excluded by others. Previous studies have suggested that the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) is a key brain region involved in the detection of social exclusion. However, this region has also been shown to be sensitive to non-social expectancy violations. We often expect other people to follow an unwritten rule in which they include us as they would expect to be included, such that social exclusion likely involves some degree of expectancy violation. The present event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study sought to separate the effects of expectancy violation from those of social exclusion, such that we employed an “overinclusion” condition in which a player was unexpectedly overincluded in the game by the other players. With this modification, we found that the dACC and right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (rVLPFC) were activated by exclusion, relative to overinclusion. In addition, we identified a negative correlation between exclusion-evoked brain activity and self-rated social pain in the rVLPFC, but not in the dACC. These findings suggest that the rVLPFC is critical for regulating social pain, whereas the dACC plays an important role in the detection of exclusion. The neurobiological basis of social exclusion is different from that of mere expectancy violation.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00010</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00010</link>
        <title><![CDATA[The optimal calibration hypothesis: how life history modulates the brain's social pain network]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-07-05T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Hypothesis and Theory</category>
        <author>David S. Chester</author><author>Richard S. Pond</author><author>Stephanie B. Richman</author><author>C. Nathan DeWall</author>
        <description><![CDATA[A growing body of work demonstrates that the brain responds similarly to physical and social injury. Both experiences are associated with activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and anterior insula. This dual functionality of the dACC and anterior insula underscores the evolutionary importance of maintaining interpersonal bonds. Despite the weight that evolution has placed on social injury, the pain response to social rejection varies substantially across individuals. For example, work from our lab demonstrated that the brain's social pain response is moderated by attachment style: anxious-attachment was associated with greater intensity and avoidant-attachment was associated with less intensity in dACC and insula activation. In an attempt to explain these divergent responses in the social pain network, we propose the optimal calibration hypothesis, which posits variation in social rejection in early life history stages shifts the threshold of an individual's social pain network such that the resulting pain sensitivity will be increased by volatile social rejection and reduced by chronic social rejection. Furthermore, the social pain response may be exacerbated when individuals are rejected by others of particular importance to a given life history stage (e.g., potential mates during young adulthood, parents during infancy and childhood).]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00009</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00009</link>
        <title><![CDATA[The dual loop model: its relation to language and other modalities]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-07-03T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Review</category>
        <author>Michel Rijntjes</author><author>Cornelius Weiller</author><author>Tobias Bormann</author><author>Mariacristina Musso</author>
        <description><![CDATA[The current neurobiological consensus of a general dual loop system scaffolding human and primate brains gives evidence that the dorsal and ventral connections subserve similar functions, independent of the modality and species. However, most current commentators agree that although bees dance and chimpanzees grunt, these systems of communication differ qualitatively from human language. So why is language unique to humans? We discuss anatomical differences between humans and other animals, the meaning of lesion studies in patients, the role of inner speech, and compare functional imaging studies in language with other modalities in respect to the dual loop model. These aspects might be helpful for understanding what kind of biological system the language faculty is, and how it relates to other systems in our own species and others.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00008</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00008</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Learning to read aligns visual analytical skills with grapheme-phoneme mapping: evidence from illiterates]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-06-12T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Thomas Lachmann</author><author>Gunjan Khera</author><author>Narayanan Srinivasan</author><author>Cees van Leeuwen</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Learning to read puts evolutionary established speech and visual object recognition functions to novel use. As we previously showed, this leads to particular rearrangements and differentiations in these functions, for instance the habitual preference for holistic perceptual organization in visual object recognition and its suppression in perceiving letters. We performed the experiment in which the differentiation between holistic non-letter processing and analytic letter processing in literates was originally shown (van Leeuwen and Lachmann, 2004) with illiterate adults. The original differentiation is absent in illiterates; they uniformly showed analytic perception for both letters and non-letters. The result implies that analytic visual perception is not a secondary development resulting from learning to read but, rather, a primary mode of perceptual organization on a par with holistic perception.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00007</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00007</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Ventral and dorsal streams in the evolution of speech and language]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-05-15T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Perspective</category>
        <author>Josef P. Rauschecker</author>
        <description><![CDATA[The brains of humans and old-world monkeys show a great deal of anatomical similarity. The auditory cortical system, for instance, is organized into a ventral and a dorsal pathway in both species. A fundamental question with regard to the evolution of speech and language (as well as music) is whether human and monkey brains show principal differences in their organization (e.g., new pathways appearing as a result of a single mutation), or whether species differences are of a more subtle, quantitative nature. There is little doubt about a similar role of the ventral auditory pathway in both humans and monkeys in the decoding of spectrally complex sounds, which some authors have referred to as auditory object recognition. This includes the decoding of speech sounds (“speech perception”) and their ultimate linking to meaning in humans. The originally presumed role of the auditory dorsal pathway in spatial processing, by analogy to the visual dorsal pathway, has recently been conceptualized into a more general role in sensorimotor integration and control. Specifically for speech, the dorsal processing stream plays a role in speech production as well as categorization of phonemes during on-line processing of speech.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00005</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00005</link>
        <title><![CDATA[A Bird’s Eye View of Human Language Evolution]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-04-13T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Review</category>
        <author>Robert C. Berwick</author><author>Gabriël J. L. Beckers</author><author>Kazuo Okanoya</author><author>Johan J. Bolhuis</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Comparative studies of linguistic faculties in animals pose an evolutionary paradox: language involves certain perceptual and motor abilities, but it is not clear that this serves as more than an input–output channel for the externalization of language proper. Strikingly, the capability for auditory–vocal learning is not shared with our closest relatives, the apes, but is present in such remotely related groups as songbirds and marine mammals. There is increasing evidence for behavioral, neural, and genetic similarities between speech acquisition and birdsong learning. At the same time, researchers have applied formal linguistic analysis to the vocalizations of both primates and songbirds. What have all these studies taught us about the evolution of language? Is the comparative study of an apparently species-specific trait like language feasible? We argue that comparative analysis remains an important method for the evolutionary reconstruction and causal analysis of the mechanisms underlying language. On the one hand, common descent has been important in the evolution of the brain, such that avian and mammalian brains may be largely homologous, particularly in the case of brain regions involved in auditory perception, vocalization, and auditory memory. On the other hand, there has been convergent evolution of the capacity for auditory–vocal learning, and possibly for structuring of external vocalizations, such that apes lack the abilities that are shared between songbirds and humans. However, significant limitations to this comparative analysis remain. While all birdsong may be classified in terms of a particularly simple kind of concatenation system, the regular languages, there is no compelling evidence to date that birdsong matches the characteristic syntactic complexity of human language, arising from the composition of smaller forms like words and phrases into larger ones.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00006</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00006</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Targets for a Comparative Neurobiology of Language]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-04-09T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Review</category>
        <author>Justin T. Kiggins</author><author>Jordan A. Comins</author><author>Timothy Q. Gentner</author>
        <description><![CDATA[One longstanding impediment to progress in understanding the neural basis of language is the development of model systems that retain language-relevant cognitive behaviors yet permit invasive cellular neuroscience methods. Recent experiments in songbirds suggest that this group may be developed into a powerful animal model, particularly for components of grammatical processing. It remains unknown, however, what a neuroscience of language perception may look like when instantiated at the cellular or network level. Here we deconstruct language perception into a minimal set of cognitive processes necessary to support grammatical processing. We then review the current state of our understanding about the neural mechanisms of these requisite cognitive processes in songbirds. We note where current knowledge is lacking, and suggest how these mechanisms may ultimately combine to support an emergent mechanism capable of processing grammatical structures of differing complexity.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00004</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00004</link>
        <title><![CDATA[The Language–Number Interface in the Brain: A Complex Parametric Study of Quantifiers and Quantities]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-03-21T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Stefan Heim</author><author>Katrin Amunts</author><author>Dan Drai</author><author>Simon B. Eickhoff</author><author>Sarah Hautvast</author><author>Yosef Grodzinsky</author>
        <description><![CDATA[The neural bases for numerosity and language are of perennial interest. In monkeys, neural separation of numerical Estimation and numerical Comparison has been demonstrated. As linguistic and numerical knowledge can only be compared in humans, we used a new fMRI paradigm in an attempt to dissociate Estimation from Comparison, and at the same time uncover the neural relation between numerosity and language. We used complex stimuli: images depicting a proportion between quantities of blue and yellow circles were coupled with sentences containing quantifiers that described them (e.g., “most/few of the circles are yellow”). Participants verified sentences against images. Both Estimation and Comparison recruited adjacent, partially overlapping bi-hemispheric fronto-parietal regions. Additional semantic analysis of positive vs. negative quantifiers involving the interpretation of quantity and numerosity specifically recruited left area 45. The anatomical proximity between numerosity regions and those involved in semantic analysis points to subtle links between the number system and language. Results fortify the homology of Estimation and Comparison between humans and monkeys.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00003</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00003</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Language Development and the Ontogeny of the Dorsal Pathway]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-02-06T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Hypothesis and Theory</category>
        <author>Angela D. Friederici</author>
        <description><![CDATA[In the absence of clear phylogenetic data on the neurobiological basis of the evolution of language, comparative studies across species and across ontogenetic stages within humans may inform us about the possible neural prerequisites of language. In the adult human brain, language-relevant regions located in the frontal and temporal cortex are connected via different fiber tracts: ventral and dorsal pathways. Ontogenetically, it has been shown that newborns display an adult-like ventral pathway at birth. The dorsal pathway, however, seems to display two subparts which mature at different rates: one part, connecting the temporal cortex to the premotor cortex, is present at birth, whereas the other part, connecting the temporal cortex to Broca’s area, develops much later and is still not fully matured at the age of seven. At this age, typically developing children still have problems in processing syntactically complex sentences. We therefore suggest that the mastery of complex syntax, which is at the core of human language, crucially depends on the full maturation of the fiber connection between the temporal cortex and Broca’s area.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00008</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00008</link>
        <title><![CDATA[The Relationship between Intelligence and Anxiety: An Association with Subcortical White Matter Metabolism]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-02-01T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Jeremy D. Coplan</author><author>Sarah Hodulik</author><author>Sanjay J. Mathew</author><author>Xiangling Mao</author><author>Patrick R. Hof</author><author>Jack M. Gorman</author><author>Dikoma C. Shungu</author>
        <description><![CDATA[We have demonstrated in a previous study that a high degree of worry in patients with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) correlates positively with intelligence and that a low degree of worry in healthy subjects correlates positively with intelligence. We have also shown that both worry and intelligence exhibit an inverse correlation with certain metabolites in the subcortical white matter. Here we re-examine the relationships among generalized anxiety, worry, intelligence, and subcortical white matter metabolism in an extended sample. Results from the original study were combined with results from a second study to create a sample comprised of 26 patients with GAD and 18 healthy volunteers. Subjects were evaluated using the Penn State Worry Questionnaire, the Wechsler Brief intelligence quotient (IQ) assessment, and proton magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging (1H-MRSI) to measure subcortical white matter metabolism of choline and related compounds (CHO). Patients with GAD exhibited higher IQ’s and lower metabolite concentrations of CHO in the subcortical white matter in comparison to healthy volunteers. When data from GAD patients and healthy controls were combined, relatively low CHO predicted both relatively higher IQ and worry scores. Relatively high anxiety in patients with GAD predicted high IQ whereas relatively low anxiety in controls also predicted high IQ. That is, the relationship between anxiety and intelligence was positive in GAD patients but inverse in healthy volunteers. The collective data suggest that both worry and intelligence are characterized by depletion of metabolic substrate in the subcortical white matter and that intelligence may have co-evolved with worry in humans.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00002</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00002</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Gestures, Vocalizations, and Memory in Language Origins]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-02-01T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Review</category>
        <author>Francisco Aboitiz</author>
        <description><![CDATA[This article discusses the possible homologies between the human language networks and comparable auditory projection systems in the macaque brain, in an attempt to reconcile two existing views on language evolution: one that emphasizes hand control and gestures, and the other that emphasizes auditory–vocal mechanisms. The capacity for language is based on relatively well defined neural substrates whose rudiments have been traced in the non-human primate brain. At its core, this circuit constitutes an auditory–vocal sensorimotor circuit with two main components, a “ventral pathway” connecting anterior auditory regions with anterior ventrolateral prefrontal areas, and a “dorsal pathway” connecting auditory areas with parietal areas and with posterior ventrolateral prefrontal areas via the arcuate fasciculus and the superior longitudinal fasciculus. In humans, the dorsal circuit is especially important for phonological processing and phonological working memory, capacities that are critical for language acquisition and for complex syntax processing. In the macaque, the homolog of the dorsal circuit overlaps with an inferior parietal–premotor network for hand and gesture selection that is under voluntary control, while vocalizations are largely fixed and involuntary. The recruitment of the dorsal component for vocalization behavior in the human lineage, together with a direct cortical control of the subcortical vocalizing system, are proposed to represent a fundamental innovation in human evolution, generating an inflection point that permitted the explosion of vocal language and human communication. In this context, vocal communication and gesturing have a common history in primate communication.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00001</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2012.00001</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Mental State Attribution and Body Configuration in Women]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-01-30T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Jennifer A. Bremser</author><author>Gordon G. Gallup</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Body configuration is a sexually dimorphic trait. In humans, men tend to have high shoulder-to-hip ratios. Women in contrast, often have low waist-to-hip ratios (WHR); i.e., narrow waists and broad hips that approximate an hour-glass configuration. Women with low WHR’s are rated as more attractive, healthier, and more fertile. They also tend to have more attractive voices, lose their virginity sooner, and have more sex partners. WHR has also been linked with general cognitive performance. In the present study we expand upon previous research examining the role of WHR in cognition. We hypothesized that more feminine body types, as indexed by a low WHR, would be associated with cognitive measures of the female “brain type,” such as mental state attribution and empathy because both may depend upon the activational effects of estrogens at puberty. We found that women with low WHRs excel at identifying emotional states of other people and show a cognitive style that favors empathizing over systemizing. We suggest this relationship may be a byproduct of greater gluteofemoral fat stores which are high in the essential fatty acids needed to support brain development and cellular functioning. It is interesting to note that our findings suggest lower WHR females, who are more likely to be targeted for dishonest courtship, may be better at identifying disingenuous claims of commitment.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00011</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00011</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Continuity, Divergence, and the Evolution of Brain Language Pathways]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-01-03T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Hypothesis and Theory</category>
        <author>James K. Rilling</author><author>Matthew F. Glasser</author><author>Saad Jbabdi</author><author>Jesper Andersson</author><author>Todd M. Preuss</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Recently, the assumption of evolutionary continuity between humans and non-human primates has been used to bolster the hypothesis that human language is mediated especially by the ventral extreme capsule pathway that mediates auditory object recognition in macaques. Here, we argue for the importance of evolutionary divergence in understanding brain language evolution. We present new comparative data reinforcing our previous conclusion that the dorsal arcuate fasciculus pathway was more significantly modified than the ventral extreme capsule pathway in human evolution. Twenty-six adult human and twenty-six adult chimpanzees were imaged with diffusion-weighted MRI and probabilistic tractography was used to track and compare the dorsal and ventral language pathways. Based on these and other data, we argue that the arcuate fasciculus is likely to be the pathway most essential for higher-order aspects of human language such as syntax and lexical–semantics.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00007</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00007</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Changes in Physiology before, during, and after Yawning]]></title>
        <pubdate>2012-01-03T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Original Research</category>
        <author>Timothy P. Corey</author><author>Melanie L. Shoup-Knox</author><author>Elana B. Gordis</author><author>Gordon G. Gallup</author>
        <description><![CDATA[The ultimate function of yawning continues to be debated. Here, we examine physiological measurements taken before, during, and after yawns in humans, in an attempt to identify key proximate mechanisms associated with this behavior. In two separate studies we measured changes in heart rate, lung volume, eye closure, skin conductance, ear pulse, respiratory sinus arrhythmia, and respiratory rate. Data were depicted from 75 s before and after yawns, and analyzed at baseline, during, and immediately following yawns. Increases in heart rate, lung volume, and eye muscle tension were observed during or immediately following yawning. Patterns of physiological changes during yawning were then compared to data from non-yawning deep inhalations. In one study, respiration period increased following the execution of a yawn. Much of the variance in physiology surrounding yawning was specific to the yawning event. This was not the case for deep inhalation. We consider our findings in light of various hypotheses about the function of yawning and conclude that they are most consistent with the brain cooling hypothesis.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00009</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00009</link>
        <title><![CDATA[The Evolution of Syntax: An Exaptationist Perspective]]></title>
        <pubdate>2011-12-23T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Hypothesis and Theory</category>
        <author>W. Tecumseh Fitch</author>
        <description><![CDATA[The evolution of language required elaboration of a number of independent mechanisms in the hominin lineage, including systems involved in signaling, semantics, and syntax. Two perspectives on the evolution of syntax can be contrasted. The “continuist” perspective seeks the evolutionary roots of complex human syntax in simpler combinatory systems used in animal communication systems, such as iteration and sequencing. The “exaptationist” perspective posits evolutionary change of function, so that systems today used for linguistic communication might previously have served quite different functions in earlier hominids. I argue that abundant biological evidence supports an exaptationist perspective, in general, and that it must be taken seriously when considering language evolution. When applied to syntax, this suggests that core computational components used today in language could have originally served non-linguistic functions such as motor control, non-verbal thought, or spatial reasoning. I outline three specific exaptationist hypotheses for spoken language. These three hypotheses each posit a change of functionality in a precursor circuit, and its transformation into a neural circuit or region specifically involved in language today. Hypothesis 1 suggests that the precursor mechanism for intentional vocal control, specifically direct cortical control over the larynx, was manual motor control subserved by the cortico-spinal tract. The second is that the arcuate fasciculus, which today connects syntactic and lexical regions, had its origin in intracortical connections subserving vocal imitation. The third is that the specialized components of Broca’s area, specifically BA 45, had their origins in non-linguistic motor control, and specifically hierarchical planning of action. I conclude by illustrating the importance of both homology (studied via primates) and convergence (typically analyzed in birds) for testing such evolutionary hypotheses.]]></description>
      </item><item>
        <guid isPermaLink="true">https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00010</guid>
        <link>https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnevo.2011.00010</link>
        <title><![CDATA[Maternal Programming of Reproductive Function and Behavior in the Female Rat]]></title>
        <pubdate>2011-12-22T00:00:00Z</pubdate>
        <category>Review</category>
        <author>Nicole M. Cameron</author>
        <description><![CDATA[Parental investment can be used as a forecast for the environmental conditions in which offspring will develop to adulthood. In the rat, maternal behavior is transmitted to the next generation through epigenetic modifications such as methylation and histone acetylation, resulting in variations in estrogen receptor alpha expression. Natural variations in maternal care also influence the sexual strategy adult females will adopt later in life. Lower levels of maternal care are associated with early onset of puberty as well as increased motivation to mate and greater receptivity toward males during mating. Lower levels of maternal care are also correlated with greater activity of the hypothalamus–pituitary–gonadal axis, responsible for the expression of these behaviors. Contrary to the transition of maternal care, sexual behavior cannot simply be explained by maternal attention, since adoption studies changed the sexual phenotypes of offspring born to low caring mothers but not those from high caring dams. Indeed, mothers showing higher levels of licking/grooming have embryos that are exposed to high testosterone levels during development, and adoption studies suggest that this androgen exposure may protect their offspring from lower levels of maternal care. We propose that in the rat, maternal care and the in utero environment interact to influence the reproductive strategy female offspring display in adulthood and that this favors the species by allowing it to thrive under different environmental conditions.]]></description>
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