fMRI activations for speech. Group activations for speech vs. rest as registered onto the MNI template brain; MNI z coordinates are given below each slice. These images are thresholded to p < 0.025, corrected for multiple comparisons using the false discovery rate (t > 3.59). The right side of the slice is the right side of the brain. Note that the coordinates listed in Table 1 are converted into Talairach coordinates, and so there are some discrepancies between the MNI slices shown for the peak activations in this figure and the Talairach coordinates listed in the table. Below this are the results of three sets of subtraction analyses, with a focus on motor cortex activations, with images thresholded to p < 0.025, corrected for multiple comparisons using the false discovery rate: speech vs. tongue movement (t > 3.86); speech vs. lip movement (t > 3.84); and speech vs. monotone-phonation (t > 4.01). Abbreviations (from left to right): SMA, supplementary motor area; M1, primary motor cortex; PMC, premotor cortex; Spt, cortex of the dorsal Sylvian fissure at the parietal–temporal junction; pSTG, posterior part of the superior temporal gyrus; aSTG, anterior part of the superior temporal gyrus; CB-VI, lobule VI of the cerebellum; CB-VIIIA, lobule VIIIA of the cerebellum; RO, Rolandic operculum; MTG, middle temporal gyrus.

Key brain areas of the vocal circuit. Shaded boxes represent “primary” areas that are principal regions for the control of phonation in speaking and singing. White boxes represent “secondary” areas that are less reliably activated during phonation and that might be more important for articulation. See text for details. This is not meant to be a comprehensive connectivity diagram. The focus is placed on the connectivity between these multiple areas and the primary motor/premotor cortex, rather than on connections among the other areas. Connectivity data is based principally on the afferent and efferent connections of the M1 larynx area of the Rhesus monkey, as described in Simonyan and Jürgens (2002, 2003, 2005a, 2005b). The projection from the motor cortex to the cerebellum is via the pontine nuclei. As described in the text, lobule VIII of the cerebellum may turn out to be a primary area, but many imaging studies, especially PET studies, have not included this part of the cerebellum in their field of view. Abbreviations: SMA, supplementary motor area; CMA, cingulate motor area; pSTG, posterior part of the superior temporal gyrus; aSTG, anterior part of the superior temporal gyrus; Spt, cortex of the dorsal Sylvian fissure at the parietal–temporal junction.

Major ALE foci from the meta-analysis. (a) Major ALE foci for the syllable-singing meta-analysis. Principal sites of activation are labelled; some bilateral cortical activations are labelled on only one side of the brain. Talairach z coordinates are shown below each slice. (b) Comparison of the ALE foci from the current meta-analysis of syllable-singing and a meta-analysis of overt reading performed by Turkeltaub et al. (2002). The color scheme for ALE activations in this panel is the following: red = syllable-singing, blue = reading, yellow = overlap. The labels in this panel highlight the vocal-motor areas shown by the meta-analysis to have large cross-laboratory concordance. For the bottom panel only, yellow labels refer to common activations between speaking and syllable-singing, and red labels refer to foci unique to syllable-singing. The Talairach coordinates for the slices are shown at the bottom of the figure. In choosing slice levels for this composite analysis, we attempted to present slices that were intermediate between the peak activations for syllable-singing and those for reading where differences existed between them (see Table 4 for coordinates). The only location where this does not work well is the slice at z = 32, which gives the impression that the CMA is uniquely present in syllable-singing, when the speech focus is actually 7 mm higher, and thus not present in this slice. Hence, the label for the CMA is colored yellow instead of red. The right side of a slice is the right side of the brain. The threshold for both analyses is p < 0.05, corrected for multiple comparisons using the false discovery rate. Abbreviations (from left to right) are: SMA, supplementary motor area; M1, primary motor cortex; CMA, cingulate motor area; RO, Rolandic operculum; pSTG, posterior part of the superior temporal gyrus; FO, frontal operculum; Put., putamen; aSTG, anterior part of the superior temporal gyrus; CB-VI, lobule VI of the cerebellum. (For interpretation of the references in color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)