Researchers Discover New Brain Function

If, like many people, you never forget a face but are terrible with names, it’s the “broker” in your brain you should blame.

“Broker” is what scientists are calling a newly discovered brain function that, most of the time, enables us to dip into our enormous store of words and dredge up the correct one for a face or object.

Neuroscientists had long believed that retrieving known words was just a two-step process: One part of your brain recognized the concept (it’s an eating utensil, or a musical instrument) and then triggered a separate speech center that would in turn produce the specific word (“spoon” or “clarinet”).

But Drs. Hanna and Antonio Damasio, renowned neuroscientists at the University of Iowa, say they’ve found there’s a previously unsuspected middleman.

“We find evidence that you don’t go from concepts to words nonstop,” said Dr. Antonio Damasio. “There’s an intermediary structure that helps you go from one to the other, like a diplomatic broker that is talking to both sides at the same time.”

Moreoever, he said, there may be as many brokers as there are categories of words.