Read the following passage to answer question.
In order to get access to the inner working of the brain, researchers recruited 12 men and 4 women who were setto undergo surgery for malignant brain tumors. During neurosurgery, researchers attached electrodes to each participant's Broca's area — the part of the brain responsible for speech production - to monitor its activity during a series of tests. Participants were fully conscious during the tests and surgery was performed using local anesthesia.
In the first part of the test, participants read Italian words and phrases out loud while researchers measured both the sound waves of the speech and electrical signals in the brain. In the second partofthe test, participants silently read the same words and phrases thatthey had just spoken.
An interesting pattern emerged. When reading aloud, patients showed activity in Broca's area that corresponded to the sound frequencies of the words. And when reading silently, their brains also mimicked the sound frequencies of each phrase. Atan anatomical level, then, reading silently is the brain internally speaking to itself.
Disponível em: http://www.discovermagazine.com. Acesso em: 06 abr. 2015.
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