Neurolinguistics is the study of the
neural mechanisms in the
human brain that control the comprehension, production, and acquisition of
language. As an interdisciplinary field, neurolinguistics draws methods and theories from fields such as
neuroscience,
linguistics,
cognitive science,
neurobiology,
communication disorders,
neuropsychology, and
computer science. Researchers are drawn to the field from a variety of backgrounds, bringing along a variety of experimental techniques as well as widely varying theoretical perspectives. Much work in neurolinguistics is informed by models in
psycholinguistics and
theoretical linguistics, and is focused on investigating how the brain can implement the processes that theoretical and psycholinguistics propose are necessary in producing and comprehending language. Neurolinguists study the physiological mechanisms by which the brain processes information related to language, and evaluate linguistic and psycholinguistic theories, using
aphasiology,
brain imaging,
electrophysiology, and
computer modeling.