Language and action
Many people thought the brain uses the same system for language and action. I showed it mostly does not. Nearby parts of Broca's area do different jobs.
Digital Therapeutics · Cognitive Neuroscience
Giorgio Papitto
Project Manager at GAIA · PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience
I work in digital therapeutics. Before that, I spent five years researching how the brain handles language and action, and earned a PhD from the Max Planck Institute. I come from literature and linguistics, and I like problems that need more than one field to solve.
01
About
My background spans literature, linguistics, and a PhD in cognitive neuroscience from the Max Planck Institute. I have always wanted to understand human behavior and health from more than one angle.
Today I work in digital therapeutics. Day to day, I dig into patient-outcome and engagement data, weigh the clinical and economic evidence, and help work out where a treatment fits and who it helps.
Before that, I spent five years studying the brain — how it handles language and action — with brain imaging and stimulation. That training still shapes how I think.
Outside work, I play badminton, write poetry, and listen to a lot of music. Wilco and Swans above all.
02
Experience
-
Oct 2023 — present
Project Manager — GAIA
Digital therapeutics · Hamburg (remote). I analyze patient-outcome and engagement data and turn clinical and real-world evidence into decisions, working with clinical and pharma partners.
-
Apr 2018 — Sep 2023
Doctoral Researcher — Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive & Brain Sciences
Leipzig, Germany. Led research on language and action in the brain. Designed studies, ran experiments, and published peer-reviewed papers.
-
Sep 2017 — Feb 2018
Research Assistant — RWTH Aachen University
Aachen, Germany. Internship at the Division for Clinical Cognitive Sciences, Department of Neurology.
03
Research
During my PhD I studied how the brain handles language and action. Here is the short version.
From goal to movement
I looked at how the brain turns a plan into a movement, and how the frontal and motor regions share the work.
Language beyond speech
I studied sign language and negation across languages. The brain's language network does its job whether the signal is sound or sign.
04
Publications
Peer-reviewed articles
-
2024
Distinct neural mechanisms for action access and execution in the human brain: insights from an fMRI study
Cerebral Cortex, 34(4), bhae163. Open Access
Abstract
Goal-directed actions are fundamental to human behavior, whereby inner goals are achieved through mapping action representations to motor outputs. The left premotor cortex (BA6) and the posterior portion of Broca's area (BA44) are two modulatory poles of the action system. However, how these regions support the representation–output mapping within the system is not yet understood. To address this, we conducted a finger-tapping fMRI experiment using action categories ranging from specific to general. We found distinct neural behaviors in BA44 and BA6 during action category processing and motor execution. During access of action categories, activity in a posterior portion of BA44 (pBA44) decreased linearly as categories became less specific; conversely, during motor execution, activity in BA6 increased linearly with less specific categories. We suggest that pBA44 facilitates access to action categories using motor information from the behavioral context, while the premotor cortex integrates motor information to execute the selected action.
-
2023
Cleaning up the Brickyard: How Theory and Methodology Shape Experiments in Cognitive Neuroscience of Language
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 35(12), 2067–2088. Open Access
Abstract
The capacity for language is a defining property of our species, yet despite decades of research, evidence on its neural basis is still mixed and a generalized consensus is difficult to achieve. We suggest that this is partly caused by researchers defining "language" in different ways, with focus on a wide range of phenomena, properties, and levels of investigation. Accordingly, there is very little agreement among cognitive neuroscientists of language on the operationalization of fundamental concepts to be investigated in neuroscientific experiments. Here, we review chains of derivation in the cognitive neuroscience of language, focusing on how the hypothesis under consideration is defined by a combination of theoretical and methodological assumptions. We first attempt to disentangle the complex relationship between linguistics, psychology, and neuroscience in the field. Next, we focus on how conclusions that can be drawn from any experiment are inherently constrained by auxiliary assumptions, both theoretical and methodological, on which the validity of conclusions rests. These issues are discussed in the context of classical experimental manipulations as well as study designs that employ novel approaches such as naturalistic stimuli and computational modeling. We conclude by proposing that a highly interdisciplinary field such as the cognitive neuroscience of language requires researchers to form explicit statements concerning the theoretical definitions, methodological choices, and other constraining factors involved in their work.
-
2021
Embodied negation and levels of concreteness: A TMS study on German and Italian language processing
Brain Research, 147523.
Abstract
According to the embodied cognition perspective, linguistic negation may block the motor simulations induced by language processing. TMS was applied to the left primary motor cortex (hand area) of monolingual Italian and German participants during rapid serial visual presentation of sentences from their own language, where the negative particle is located at the beginning and at the end of the sentence, respectively. We investigated whether the interruption of motor simulation (reduced motor evoked potentials) takes place similarly across two languages differing in the position of the negative marker, and manipulated levels of sentence concreteness. Our findings indicate that negation acts as a block on motor representations, but independently from the language and word concreteness level.
-
2021
Functional neuroanatomy of language without speech: An ALE meta-analysis of sign language
Human Brain Mapping, 42(3), 699–712. Open Access
Abstract
Sign language conveys linguistic information using gestures instead of sounds. Applying a meta-analytic estimation approach to neuroimaging studies (N = 23; subjects = 316), we ask whether sign-language comprehension in deaf signers relies on the same primarily left-hemispheric cortical network implicated in spoken and written language comprehension in hearing speakers. We show that sign language recruits bilateral fronto-temporo-occipital regions with strong left-lateralization in Broca's area; that Broca's area constitutes a hub attributing abstract linguistic information to gestures; and that sign-language-specific voxels in Broca's area are also crucially involved in spoken and written language. This suggests the human brain evolved a lateralized language network with a supramodal hub in Broca's area that computes linguistic information independent of speech.
-
2020
Language and action in Broca's area: Computational differentiation and cortical segregation
Brain and Cognition, 147, 105651. Open Access
Abstract
Actions have been proposed to follow hierarchical principles similar to those hypothesized for language syntax, reflected in the common involvement of neural populations of Broca's area in the inferior frontal gyrus. In this position paper, we follow an influential hypothesis in linguistic theory to introduce the syntactic operation Merge and the corresponding motor/conceptual interfaces. We argue that action hierarchies do not follow the same principles ruling language syntax; rather, hierarchy in the action domain lies in predictive processing mechanisms mapping sensory inputs and statistical regularities of action–goal relationships. Distinct Broca's subregions appear to support different computations across domains: anterior BA44 as a hub for Merge, posterior BA44 for selecting premotor representations from contextual signals.
-
2020
The topographical organization of motor processing: An ALE meta-analysis on six action domains and the relevance of Broca's region
NeuroImage, 206, 116321. Open Access
Abstract
Action is a cover term for a large set of motor processes differing in domain specificities. Using Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) and Meta-Analytic Connectivity Modeling (MACM) (N = 416; subjects = 5912), we delineate the functional specificities of six domains: action execution, imitation, motor imagery, action observation, motor learning, and motor preparation. Results show distinct functional patterns, with convergence in posterior BA44 (pBA44) for execution, imitation and imagery. The connectivity network seeding in this motor-related pBA44 cluster differs from the network seeding in the language-related anterior BA44, implementing distinct cognitive functions. We propose the motor-related network encompassing pBA44 is recruited when processing movements requiring a mental representation of the action itself.
Dissertations
-
2024
The Distinctive Function of Brodmann Area 44 in the Neural Networks of Action and Its Segregation from Language
MPI Series in Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Vol. 226. Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, 2024. ISBN 978-3-948679-12-5.
-
2018
Typology and structure of the embodied negation: a TMS study
Alma Mater Studiorum — Università di Bologna, Italy. Supervised by Lugli, L., Borghi, A. M., Pellicano, A. & Binkofski, F.
Selected media coverage
05
Talks & Posters
Invited & conference talks
-
2022
Neurobiology of the relationship between action and language processing
Joint Conference on Language Evolution (JCoLE), Japan.
-
2022
The retrieval of hierarchical information in mental representations of action and its segregation from language
Invited talk — Brain, Language, Inference & Thought (BLIT) Lab, Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan.
-
2021
A behavioral pilot study on the retrieval of hierarchical information in mental representations of action and its segregation from language
Protolang 7, HHU Düsseldorf, Germany.
-
2019
Functional neuroanatomy of sign language in deaf signers: Activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis and meta-analytic connectivity mapping
DISPOC Conference on Brain, Learning and Language, University of Siena, Italy.
-
2017
I am here now: the necessity of a bifocal logic
PhiLang, University of Łódź, Poland.
Poster presentations
-
2023
Examining the role of cortical mechanisms in the processing of action representations: An fMRI investigation of cognitive control and motor processing
Rovereto Workshop on Concepts, Actions, and Objects, Rovereto, Italy.
-
2021
Classifying actions: A behavioral pilot study on the retrieval of action representations
IMPRS Summer School in Cognitive Neuroscience, Leipzig, Germany.
-
2019
Infero-frontal functional convergence for action domains and feature specificity: An Activation Likelihood Estimation meta-analysis
IMPRS Summer School in Cognitive Neuroscience, Leipzig, Germany.
-
2019
Reviewing the functional neuroanatomy of sign language in deaf signers: An Activation Likelihood Estimation meta-analysis
IMPRS Summer School in Cognitive Neuroscience, Leipzig, Germany.
-
2019
The neural basis of sign language processing in deaf signers: An Activation Likelihood Estimation meta-analysis
13th Conference of Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research (TISLR), Hamburg, Germany.
-
2019
The neural correlates of actions: a meta-analytical perspective on motor domains and movement features
Rovereto Workshop on Concepts, Actions, and Objects, Rovereto, Italy.
06
Curriculum
Education
-
2018 — 2023
PhD — Psychology / Cognitive Neuroscience (summa cum laude)
International Max Planck Research School on Neuroscience of Communication, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive & Brain Sciences, Leipzig. Advisors: Prof. Angela D. Friederici, Dr. Emiliano Zaccarella & Prof. Christian Doeller.
-
2018
MA — Italian Studies, European Literary Cultures, Linguistics (summa cum laude)
Alma Mater Studiorum — Università di Bologna, Italy. Thesis: "Typology and structure of the embodied negation: a TMS study." Supervisors: Prof. Luisa Lugli, Prof. Anna Maria Borghi & Prof. Ferdinand Binkofski.
-
2014 — 2015
Erasmus+ Scholarship
Faculty of Philosophy, University of Tübingen, Germany.
-
2015
BA — Languages, Cultures, Literature, Translation (summa cum laude)
Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, Sapienza Università di Roma, Italy. Thesis: "With sober words: Linguistic analysis of the class newspapers of Alatri (1932–1937)." Supervisor: Prof. Paola Cantoni.
Teaching
- Planning & Conducting a Psychology Experiment — University of Leipzig (WS 20/21). Experimental design, PsychoPy, EEG & fMRI programming, analysis in R.
- A guide to online experiments using Pavlovia — Workshop, University of Potsdam (2021).
Service
- Reviewer — Frontiers in Psychology · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews · The Journal of Neuroscience · NeuroImage · SAGE Open.
- Organiser — Workshop "Segregation and overlap between action and language" (2022); Leipzig Lectures on Language 2021 — Combinatorics.
07
Contact
Want to talk — about digital health, research, or working together? Find me here.