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Novel Adjective Processing in Preschool Children: Evidence From Event-Related Brain Potentials.

ABSTRACT: Purpose Recent findings in preschool children indicated novel adjective recall was enhanced when learned using repeated retrieval with contextual reinstatement (RRCR) compared to repeated study (RS). Recall was similar for learned pictures used during training and new (generalized) pictures with the same adjective features. The current study compared the effects of learning method and learned/generalized pictures on the neural processes mediating the recognition of novel adjectives. Method Twenty typically developing children aged 4;6-5;11 (years;months) learned four novel adjectives, two using RRCR and two using RS. Five-minute and 1-week tests assessed adjective recall using learned and generalized pictures. Also, at the 1-week visit, event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded to assess children's processing of learned/generalized pictures, followed by naturally spoken novel adjectives in a match-mismatch paradigm. Results Naming recall and match-mismatch judgment accuracy were similar for the RS and RRCR conditions and across learned/generalized pictures. However, ERPs revealed more reliable condition effects in the phonological mapping negativity, indexing phonological expectations, and the late positive component, indexing semantic reanalysis, for the adjectives learned in the RRCR relative to the RS condition. Unfamiliar pictures (generalized) elicited larger amplitude N300 and N400 components relative to learned pictures. Conclusions Although behavioral accuracy measures suggest similar effects of the RS and RRCR learning conditions, subtle differences in the ERPs underlying novel adjective processing indicate advantages of RRCR for phonological processing and semantic reanalysis. While children readily generalized the novel adjectives, ERPs revealed greater cognitive resources for processing unfamiliar compared to learned pictures of the novel adjective characteristics. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.13683214.

SUBMITTER: Gerwin KL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8632481 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:Purpose:This investigation was conducted to determine whether young children with autism spectrum disorders exhibited a canonical neural response to word stimuli and whether putative event-related potential (ERP) measures of word processing were correlated with a concurrent measure of receptive language. Additional exploratory analyses were used to examine whether the magnitude of the association between ERP measures of word processing and receptive language varied as a function of the number of word stimuli the participants reportedly understood. Method:Auditory ERPs were recorded in response to spoken words and nonwords presented with equal probability in 34 children aged 2-5 years with a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder who were in the early stages of language acquisition. Average amplitudes and amplitude differences between word and nonword stimuli within 200-500 ms were examined at left temporal (T3) and parietal (P3) electrode clusters. Receptive vocabulary size and the number of experimental stimuli understood were concurrently measured using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories. Results:Across the entire participant group, word-nonword amplitude differences were diminished. The average word-nonword amplitude difference at T3 was related to receptive vocabulary only if 5 or more word stimuli were understood. Conclusions:If ERPs are to ever have clinical utility, their construct validity must be established by investigations that confirm their associations with predictably related constructs. These results contribute to accruing evidence, suggesting that a valid measure of auditory word processing can be derived from the left temporal response to words and nonwords. In addition, this measure can be useful even for participants who do not reportedly understand all of the words presented as experimental stimuli, though it will be important for researchers to track familiarity with word stimuli in future investigations. Supplemental Material:https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.5614840.

Project description:Previous research has pointed out that the combination of orthographic and semantic-associative training is a more advantageous strategy for the lexicalization of novel written word-forms than their single orthographic training. However, paradigms used previously involve explicit stimuli categorization (lexical decision), which likely influence word learning. In the present study, we used a more automatic task (silent reading) to determine the advantage of the associative training, by comparing the brain electrical signals elicited in combined (orthographic and semantic) and single (only orthographic) training conditions. In addition, the learning effect (in terms of similar neurophysiological activity between novel and known words) was also tested under a categorization paradigm, enabling determination of the possible influence of the training task in the lexicalization process. Results indicated that novel words repeatedly associated with meaningful cues showed a higher attenuation of N400 responses than those trained in the single orthographic condition, confirming the higher facilitation in the lexico-semantic processing of these stimuli, as a consequence of semantic associations. Moreover, only when the combined training was carried out in the reading task did novel words show similar N400 responses to those elicited by known words, suggesting the achievement of a similar lexical processing to known words. Crucially, when the training is carried out under a demanding task context (lexical decision), known words exhibited positive enhancement within the N400 time window, contributing to maintaining N400 differences with novel trained words and confounding the outcome of the learning. Such deflection-compatible with the modulation of the categorization-related P300 component-suggests that novel word learning could be influenced by the activation of categorization-related processes. Thus, the use of low-demand tasks arises as a more appropriate approach to study novel word learning, enabling the build-up process of mental representations, which probably depends on pure lexical and semantic factors rather than being guided by categorization demands.

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Novel Adjective Processing in Preschool Children: Evidence From Event-Related Brain Potentials.

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