17 research outputs found

    Neural tracking in infancy predicts language development in children with and without family history of autism

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    During speech processing, neural activity in non-autistic adults and infants tracks the speech envelope. Recent research in adults indicates that this neural tracking relates to linguistic knowledge and may be reduced in autism. Such reduced tracking, if present already in infancy, could impede language development. In the current study, we focused on children with a family history of autism, who often show a delay in first language acquisition. We investigated whether differences in tracking of sung nursery rhymes during infancy relate to language development and autism symptoms in childhood. We assessed speech-brain coherence at either 10 or 14 months of age in a total of 22 infants with high likelihood of autism due to family history and 19 infants without family history of autism. We analyzed the relationship between speech-brain coherence in these infants and their vocabulary at 24 months as well as autism symptoms at 36 months. Our results showed significant speech-brain coherence in the 10- and 14-month-old infants. We found no evidence for a relationship between speech-brain coherence and later autism symptoms. Importantly, speech-brain coherence in the stressed syllable rate (1–3 Hz) predicted later vocabulary. Follow-up analyses showed evidence for a relationship between tracking and vocabulary only in 10-month-olds but not 14-month-olds and indicated possible differences between the likelihood groups. Thus, early tracking of sung nursery rhymes is related to language development in childhood

    Neural Tracking in Infancy Predicts Language Development in Children With and Without Family History of Autism

    Get PDF
    During speech processing, neural activity in non-autistic adults and infants tracks the speech envelope. Recent research in adults indicates that this neural tracking relates to linguistic knowledge and may be reduced in autism. Such reduced tracking, if present already in infancy, could impede language development. In the current study, we focused on children with a family history of autism, who often show a delay in first language acquisition. We investigated whether differences in tracking of sung nursery rhymes during infancy relate to language development and autism symptoms in childhood. We assessed speech-brain coherence at either 10 or 14 months of age in a total of 22 infants with high likelihood of autism due to family history and 19 infants without family history of autism. We analyzed the relationship between speech-brain coherence in these infants and their vocabulary at 24 months as well as autism symptoms at 36 months. Our results showed significant speech-brain coherence in the 10-and 14-month-old infants. We found no evidence for a relationship between speech-brain coherence and later autism symptoms. Importantly, speech-brain coherence in the stressed syllable rate (1–3 Hz) predicted later vocabulary. Follow-up analyses showed evidence for a relationship between tracking and vocabulary only in 10-month-olds but not in 14-month-olds and indicated possible differences between the likelihood groups. Thus, early tracking of sung nursery rhymes is related to language development in childhood

    Maturational constraints on tracking of temporal attention in infant language acquisition.

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    Children are active learners: they selectively attend to important information. Rhythmic neural tracking of speech is central to active language learning. This chapter evaluates recent research showing that neural oscillations in the infant brain synchronise with the rhythm of speech, tracking it at different frequencies. This process predicts word segmentation and later language abilities. We argue that rhythmic neural speech tracking reflects infants’ attention to specific parts of the speech signal (e.g., stressed syllables), and simultaneously acts as a core mechanism for maximising temporal attention onto those parts. Rhythmic neural tracking of speech puts a constraint on neural processing, which maximises the uptake of relevant information from the noisy multimodal environment. We hypothesise this to be influenced by neural maturation. We end by evaluating the implications of this proposal for language acquisition research, and discuss how differences in neural maturation relate to variance in language development in autism

    Early Acquisition of Phonological Categories Depends on the Duration of Features in Speech

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    During language acquisition, infant speech perception becomes selective for the speech sounds of their native language. It is unclear how infants can infer native speech sounds given a critical neurobiological limitation: The infant brain is too slow to match the rate of speech sounds-or phonemes-in natural speech. Infant brains are characterized exclusively by slow electrophysiological activity. Here we show that early categorical acquisition hinges on the timing of phonological features. In particular, the order of acquisition seems to depend on the duration of features in speech. We employ deconvolution modeling of EEG recorded during speech processing from a large sample of children across the first five years of life. From about 14 months of age, the EEG indicates neural sensitivity to categories that are continuous across sequences of multiple subsequent phonemes, thus fitting infants' long temporal receptive windows. Features that alternate at faster rates are added step by step, with the fastest rates acquired last. Categorical sensitivity was not observed for a non-native baseline. Trajectories of acoustic processing did not differ across native- and non-native languages, suggesting that emerging categorical processing was not driven by an enhancement of auditory processing abilities. Category-continuous stretches may thus allow categorical knowledge to emerge in spite of slow electrophysiology. Early language acquisition may rely on a symmetric relationship between electrophysiological resolution and the timing of the to-be-acquired linguistic units

    Does Electrophysiological Maturation Shape Language Acquisition?

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    Infants master temporal patterns of their native language at a developmental trajectory from slow to fast: Shortly after birth, they recognize the slow acoustic modulations specific to their native language before tuning into faster language-specific patterns between 6-12 months of age. We here propose that this trajectory is constrained by neuronal maturation-in particular, the gradual emergence of high-frequency neural oscillations in the infant electroencephalogram. Infants' initial focus on slow prosodic modulations is consistent with the prenatal availability of slow electrophysiological activity (i.e., theta-- and delta-band oscillations). Our proposal is consistent with the temporal patterns of infant-directed speech, which initially amplifies slow modulations, approaching the faster modulation range of adult-directed speech only as infants' language has advanced sufficiently. Moreover, our proposal agrees with evidence from premature infants showing maturational age is a stronger predictor of language development than ex-utero exposure to speech, indicating that premature infants cannot exploit their earlier availability of speech because of electrophysiological constraints. In sum, we provide a new perspective on language acquisition emphasizing neuronal development as critical driving force of infants' language development

    Neural Tracking in Infancy Predicts Language Development in Children With and Without Family History of Autism

    No full text
    During speech processing, neural activity in non-autistic adults and infants tracks the speech envelope. Recent research in adults indicates that this neural tracking relates to linguistic knowledge and may be reduced in autism. Such reduced tracking, if present already in infancy, could impede language development. In the current study, we focused on children with a family history of autism, who often show a delay in first language acquisition. We investigated whether differences in tracking of sung nursery rhymes during infancy relate to language development and autism symptoms in childhood. We assessed speech-brain coherence at either 10 or 14 months of age in a total of 22 infants with high likelihood of autism due to family history and 19 infants without family history of autism. We analyzed the relationship between speech-brain coherence in these infants and their vocabulary at 24 months as well as autism symptoms at 36 months. Our results showed significant speech-brain coherence in the 10- and 14-month-old infants. We found no evidence for a relationship between speech-brain coherence and later autism symptoms. Importantly, speech-brain coherence in the stressed syllable rate (1-3 Hz) predicted later vocabulary. Follow-up analyses showed evidence for a relationship between tracking and vocabulary only in 10-month-olds but not 14-month-olds and indicated possible differences between the likelihood groups. Thus, early tracking of sung nursery rhymes is related to language development in childhood

    Neural tracking in infancy predicts language development in children with and without family history of autism

    No full text
    During speech processing, neural activity in non-autistic adults and infants tracks the speech envelope. Recent research in adults indicates that this neural tracking relates to linguistic knowledge and may be reduced in autism. Such reduced tracking, if present already in infancy, could impede language development. In the current study, we focused on children with a family history of autism, who often show a delay in first language acquisition. We investigated whether differences in tracking of sung nursery rhymes during infancy relate to language development and autism symptoms in childhood. We assessed speech-brain coherence at either 10 or 14 months of age in a total of 22 infants with high likelihood of autism due to family history and 19 infants without family history of autism. We analyzed the relationship between speech-brain coherence in these infants and their vocabulary at 24 months as well as autism symptoms at 36 months. Our results showed significant speech-brain coherence in the 10- and 14-month-old infants. We found no evidence for a relationship between speech-brain coherence and later autism symptoms. Importantly, speech-brain coherence in the stressed syllable rate (1–3 Hz) predicted later vocabulary. Follow-up analyses showed evidence for a relationship between tracking and vocabulary only in 10-month-olds but not in 14-month-olds and indicated possible differences between the likelihood groups. Thus, early tracking of sung nursery rhymes is related to language development in childhood

    Neural Tracking in Infancy Predicts Language Development in Children With and Without Family History of Autism

    No full text
    During speech processing, neural activity in non-autistic adults and infants tracks the speech envelope. Recent research in adults indicates that this neural tracking relates to linguistic knowledge and may be reduced in autism. Such reduced tracking, if present already in infancy, could impede language development. In the current study, we focused on children with a family history of autism, who often show a delay in first language acquisition. We investigated whether differences in tracking of sung nursery rhymes during infancy relate to language development and autism symptoms in childhood. We assessed speech-brain coherence at either 10 or 14 months of age in a total of 22 infants with high likelihood of autism due to family history and 19 infants without family history of autism. We analyzed the relationship between speech-brain coherence in these infants and their vocabulary at 24 months as well as autism symptoms at 36 months. Our results showed significant speech-brain coherence in the 10-and 14-month-old infants. We found no evidence for a relationship between speech-brain coherence and later autism symptoms. Importantly, speech-brain coherence in the stressed syllable rate (1–3 Hz) predicted later vocabulary. Follow-up analyses showed evidence for a relationship between tracking and vocabulary only in 10-month-olds but not in 14-month-olds and indicated possible differences between the likelihood groups. Thus, early tracking of sung nursery rhymes is related to language development in childhood
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