Infants' brain responses for speech sound changes in fast multifeature MMN paradigm.
Abstract Objective We investigated whether newborn speech-sound discrimination can be studied in 40min using fast multifeature mismatch negativity (MMN) paradigm and do the results differ from those obtained with the traditional oddball paradigm. Methods Newborns' MMN responses to five types of changes (consonant identity, F0, intensity, vowel duration and vowel identity) were recorded in the multifeature group ( N =15) and vowel duration and vowel identity changes in the oddball group ( N =13), after which the MMNs from both groups were compared with each others. Results Statistically significant MMNs in the 190–600ms time range from the stimulus onset were found for most change types in b…
Perinatal cerebral insults alter auditory event-related potentials.
Background: Auditory event-related potentials (AERPs) can be used as indices of neural information processing. Altered AERPs have been reported in children and young adults with frontal lobe infarction. Aim: To test the hypothesis that perinatal brain injury affects cortical auditory processing. Methods: We assessed AERPs at term. 6 and 12 months of age in preterm infants [n = 9. median gestational age (GA) 27.9, range 23.9-30.0 wk], term infants with perinatal intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) [n = 5, GA 40.3, range 37.4-42.3 wk], and term infants with perinatal asphyxia In [n = 4. GA 39.4. range 37.9-40.3 wk]. Healthy preterm (n = 16) and term infants (n = 22) served as controls. A harmonic …
Auditory event-related potentials at preschool age in children born very preterm.
Abstract Objective To assess auditory event-related potentials at preschool age in children born very preterm (VP, 27.4±1.9 gestational weeks, n =70) with a high risk of cognitive dysfunction. Methods We used an oddball paradigm consisting of a standard tone randomly replaced by one of three infrequent deviants (differing in frequency, sound direction or duration). Results The P1 and N2 latencies were inversely correlated to age (50–63months) both in VP ( r =−0.451, p r =−0.305, p= 0.01, respectively) and term born controls (TC; n =15). VP children had smaller P1 than near-term ( n =12) or TC (1.70±0.17μV vs 2.68±0.41 and 2.92±0.43, respectively; p Conclusions Our data suggest a fast matura…
Infant Event-Related Potentials to Speech are Associated with Prelinguistic Development
Highlights • Speech processing and prelinguistic skills studied in a large longitudinal sample. • Auditory ERPs predicted prelinguistic development in infancy in LCS models. • P1 amplitude at 6 months predicted prelinguistic development between 6 and 12 months. • MMR to a frequency change was associated with prelinguistic skills at 6 months. • Infants’ neural speech processing can help to predict early language development.
Learning-induced neural plasticity of speech processing before birth
Learning, the foundation of adaptive and intelligent behavior, is based on plastic changes in neural assemblies, reflected by the modulation of electric brain responses. In infancy, auditory learning implicates the formation and strengthening of neural long-term memory traces, improving discrimination skills, in particular those forming the prerequisites for speech perception and understanding. Although previous behavioral observations show that newborns react differentially to unfamiliar sounds vs. familiar sound material that they were exposed to as fetuses, the neural basis of fetal learning has not thus far been investigated. Here we demonstrate direct neural correlates of human fetal l…
An extensive pattern of atypical neural speech-sound discrimination in newborns at risk of dyslexia.
Objective: Identifying early signs of developmental dyslexia, associated with deficient speech-sound processing, is paramount to establish early interventions. We aimed to find early speech-sound processing deficiencies in dyslexia, expecting diminished and atypically lateralized event-related potentials (ERP) and mismatch responses (MMR) in newborns at dyslexia risk. Methods: ERPs were recorded to a pseudoword and its variants (vowel-duration, vowel-identity, and syllable-frequency changes) from 88 newborns at high or no familial risk. The response significance was tested, and group, laterality, and frontality effects were assessed with repeated-measures ANOVA. Results: An early positive a…
Newborn infants' auditory system is sensitive to Western music chord categories
Neural encoding of abstract rules in the audition of newborn infants has been recently demonstrated in several studies using event-related potentials (ERPs). In the present study the neural encoding of Western music chords was investigated in newborn infants. Using ERPs, we examined whether the categorizations of major vs. minor and consonance vs. dissonance are present at the level of the change-related mismatch response (MMR). Using an oddball paradigm, root minor, dissonant and inverted major chords were presented in a context of consonant root major chords. The chords were transposed to several different frequency levels, so that the deviant chords did not include a physically deviant f…
Children's brain responses to sound changes in pseudo words in a multifeature paradigm.
Abstract Objective The multifeature mismatch negativity (MMN) paradigm has previously been used to study MMN responses to changes in tones or isolated syllables. We tested 4–12year old children's MMNs to changes in a naturally produced pseudo word context. Methods We studied preschoolers' (under the age of 7years, N =15, mean age 5years 4months) and school childrens' (over the age of 7years, N =15, mean age 9years 3months) MMNs to five types of changes (vowel duration, fundamental frequency, gap, intensity, vowel identity) in the middle syllable of a pseudo word [tɑtɑtɑ] using a multifeature paradigm. Results Vowel duration and gap changes elicited larger frontocentral MMN responses than ot…
Linguistic multifeature MMN paradigm for extensive recording of auditory discrimination profiles
We studied whether a multifeature mismatch negativity (MMN) paradigm using naturally produced speech stimuli is feasible for studies of auditory discrimination accuracy of adult participants. A naturally produced trisyllabic pseudoword was used in the paradigm, and MMNs were recorded to changes that were acoustic (changes in fundamental frequency or intensity) or potentially phonological (changes in vowel identity or vowel duration). All the different changes were presented in three different word segments (initial, middle, or final syllable). All changes elicited an MMN response, but the vowel duration change elicited a different response pattern than the other deviant types. Changes in vo…
The neural basis of sublexical speech and corresponding nonspeech processing: a combined EEG-MEG study.
Abstract We addressed the neural organization of speech versus nonspeech sound processing by investigating preattentive cortical auditory processing of changes in five features of a consonant–vowel syllable (consonant, vowel, sound duration, frequency, and intensity) and their acoustically matched nonspeech counterparts in a simultaneous EEG–MEG recording of mismatch negativity (MMN/MMNm). Overall, speech–sound processing was enhanced compared to nonspeech sound processing. This effect was strongest for changes which affect word meaning (consonant, vowel, and vowel duration) in the left and for the vowel identity change in the right hemisphere also. Furthermore, in the right hemisphere, spe…
Prenatal Music Exposure Induces Long-Term Neural Effects
We investigated the neural correlates induced by prenatal exposure to melodies using brains' event-related potentials (ERPs). During the last trimester of pregnancy, the mothers in the learning group played the ‘Twinkle twinkle little star’ -melody 5 times per week. After birth and again at the age of 4 months, we played the infants a modified melody in which some of the notes were changed while ERPs to unchanged and changed notes were recorded. The ERPs were also recorded from a control group, who received no prenatal stimulation. Both at birth and at the age of 4 months, infants in the learning group had stronger ERPs to the unchanged notes than the control group. Furthermore, the ERP amp…