This is your brain on Scrabble: Neural correlates of visual word recognition in competitive Scrabble players as measured during task and resting-state

Andrea B Protzner; Ian S Hargreaves; James A Campbell; Kaia Myers-Stewart; Sophia van Hees; Bradley G Goodyear; Peter Sargious; Penny M Pexman

doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2015.03.015

This is your brain on Scrabble: Neural correlates of visual word recognition in competitive Scrabble players as measured during task and resting-state

Cortex. 2016 Feb:75:204-219. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2015.03.015. Epub 2015 Apr 1.

Authors

Andrea B Protzner¹, Ian S Hargreaves², James A Campbell³, Kaia Myers-Stewart⁴, Sophia van Hees⁵, Bradley G Goodyear⁶, Peter Sargious⁷, Penny M Pexman⁸

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Hotchkiss Brain Institute, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Seaman Family MR Research Centre, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: protzner@ucalgary.ca.
² Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Hotchkiss Brain Institute, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: ishargre@ucalgary.ca.
³ Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: jacyippee@yahoo.com.
⁴ Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: kmyersstewart@gmail.com.
⁵ Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Hotchkiss Brain Institute, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
⁶ Hotchkiss Brain Institute, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Seaman Family MR Research Centre, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Department of Radiology, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Department of Psychiatry, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: goodyear@ucalgary.ca.
⁷ Department of Medicine, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Institute for Public Health, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: Peter.Sargious@albertahealthservices.ca.
⁸ Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Hotchkiss Brain Institute, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Seaman Family MR Research Centre, University of Calgary, Foothills Medical Centre, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Electronic address: pexman@ucalgary.ca.

PMID: 26026707
DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2015.03.015

Abstract

Competitive Scrabble players devote considerable time to studying words and practicing Scrabble-related skills (e.g., anagramming). This training is associated with extraordinary performance in lexical decision, the standard visual word recognition task (Hargreaves, Pexman, Zdrazilova & Sargious, 2012). In the present study we investigated the neural consequences of this lexical expertise. Using both event-related and resting-state fMRI, we compared brain activity and connectivity in 12 competitive Scrabble experts with 12 matched non-expert controls. Results showed that when engaged in the lexical decision task (LDT), Scrabble experts made use of brain regions not generally associated with meaning retrieval in visual word recognition, but rather those associated with working memory and visual perception. The analysis of resting-state data also showed group differences, such that a different network of brain regions was associated with higher levels of Scrabble-related skill in experts than in controls.

Keywords: Expertise; Language networks; Lexical processing; Resting-state; fMRI.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Brain / physiology*
Brain Mapping*
Female
Humans
Magnetic Resonance Imaging / methods
Male
Memory, Short-Term / physiology*
Middle Aged
Nerve Net / physiology*
Semantics
Visual Perception / physiology*