In developmental lexical–gustatory synesthesia, specific words can trigger taste perceptions and these synesthetic associations are generally stable. We describe a case of multilingual lexical–gustatory synesthesia for whom some synesthesias were bidirectional as some tastes also triggered auditory word associations. Evoked concurrents could be gustatory but also tactile sensations. In addition to words and pseudowords, many voices were effective inducers, suggesting increased connections between cortical taste areas and both voice-selective and language-selective areas. Lasting changes in some evoked tastes occurred during childhood (...) suggesting that some plasticity can be present after the initial learning of associations. Inducers were often linked to taste concurrents phonologically or semantically, but also through identifiable childhood episodes . Several inducers were phonologically linked to episodic inducers suggesting a process of secondary acquisition for many inducers. Implications of these observations are discussed. (shrink)

Language is a complex intentional, syntactical and referential system involving a left-hemispheric specialization of the brain in which some cerebral regions such as Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas play a key-role. Because nonhuman primates are phylogenetically close to humans, research on our primate cousins might help providing clues for reconstructing the features of our ancestral communicative systems. In the present paper, after emphasising the tight relation between gestures and language in humans, we underlie the specific significance of communicative gestures and of (...) the progressive control of the oro-facial system and the vocal tract in the course of the language evolution. For this purpose, we will then review the findings related to the features, the lateralization and brain correlates of both vocal and gestural systems in nonhuman primates. (shrink)