A small-world brain functional network of Chinese characters processing with local functional cliques and long-distance connections

Chinese characters processing is a complex task involving word identification, phonologic assembly, semantic processing, and letter expression, etc. We built a brain functional network of Chinese characters processing (CCPBFN) with voxels in functional magnetic resonance imaging data as nodes, and significant functional connections among voxels as edges. The primary results revealed that the CCPBFN fell into the small-world networks category, which might reflect an optimal organization pattern for information processing. In a further study of the hierarchy, analyses suggested that voxels tended to connect with others in local regions to form highly interconnected cliques, and the hubs with long-distance connections joined the remote cliques into a whole. We proposed that the CCPBFN might be shaped by the complexity and neural dynamics of Chinese characters processing, which might be corresponding to the neural assemblies.