Abstract

We often express our thoughts through words, but thinking goes well beyond language. Here we focus on an elementary but basic thinking process, disjunction elimination, elicited by elementary visual scenes deprived of linguistic content, describing its neural and oculomotor correlates. We track two main components of a nonverbal deductive process: the construction of a logical representation (A or B), and its simplification by deduction (not A, therefore B). We identify the network active in the two phases and show that in the latter, but not in the former, it overlaps with areas known to respond to verbal logical reasoning. Oculomotor markers consistently differentiate logical processing induced by the construction of a representation, its simplification by deductive inference, and its maintenance when inferences cannot be drawn. Our results reveal how integrative logical processes incorporate novel experience in the flow of thoughts induced by visual scenes.

Details

Title
Seeing inferences: brain dynamics and oculomotor signatures of non-verbal deduction
Author
Martín-Salguero, Ana 1 ; Reverberi, Carlo 2 ; Solari, Aldo 3 ; Filippin, Luca 4 ; Pallier, Christophe 5 ; Bonatti, Luca L. 6 

 Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Center for Brain and Cognition, Department of Information and Communications Technologies, Barcelona, Spain (GRID:grid.5612.0) (ISNI:0000 0001 2172 2676); PSL University, Institut Jean Nicod, Département d’Études Cognitives, Ecole Normale Supérieure, EHESS, CNRS, Paris, France (GRID:grid.440907.e) (ISNI:0000 0004 1784 3645) 
 University of Milano–Bicocca, NeuroMI-Milan Center for Neuroscience and Departments of Psychology, Milan, Italy (GRID:grid.7563.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 2174 1754); University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Psychology, Milan, Italy (GRID:grid.7563.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 2174 1754); University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan Center for Neuroscience, Milan, Italy (GRID:grid.7563.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 2174 1754) 
 University of Milano–Bicocca, Department of Economics, Management and Statistics, Milan, Italy (GRID:grid.7563.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 2174 1754) 
 Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Center for Brain and Cognition, Department of Information and Communications Technologies, Barcelona, Spain (GRID:grid.5612.0) (ISNI:0000 0001 2172 2676) 
 Université Paris-Saclay, Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit U992, Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale, Commissariat à l’Énergie Atomique et aux Énergies Alternatives, Direction de la Recherche Fondamentale/Institut Joliot, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique ERL9003, NeuroSpin Center, Gif-Sur-Yvette, France (GRID:grid.460789.4) (ISNI:0000 0004 4910 6535) 
 Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Center for Brain and Cognition, Department of Information and Communications Technologies, Barcelona, Spain (GRID:grid.5612.0) (ISNI:0000 0001 2172 2676); ICREA, Barcelona, Spain (GRID:grid.425902.8) (ISNI:0000 0000 9601 989X) 
Pages
2341
Publication year
2023
Publication date
2023
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
20452322
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2774729809
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2023. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.