Beta- and gamma-band oscillatory connectivity support naturalistic reading of continuous text

Abstract Large-scale integration of information across cortical structures, building on neural connectivity, has been proposed to be a key element in supporting human cognitive processing. In electrophysiological neuroimaging studies of reading, quantification of neural interactions has been limited to the level of isolated words or sentences due to artefacts induced by eye movements. Here, we combined magnetoencephalography recording with advanced artefact rejection tools to investigate both cortico-cortical coherence and directed neural interactions during naturalistic reading of full-page texts. Our results show that reading vs. visual scanning of text was associated with wide-spread increases of cortico-cortical coherence in the beta- and gamma-bands. We further show that the reading task was linked with increased directed neural interactions compared to the scanning task across a sparse set of connections within a wide range of frequencies. Together, the results demonstrate that neural connectivity flexibly builds on different frequency bands to support continuous natural reading.