In the absence of visual input: Electrophysiological evidence of infants' mapping of labels onto auditory objects

Samuel H. Cosper, Claudia Mannel, Jutta L. Mueller

Publications: Contribution to journalArticlePeer Reviewed

Abstract

Despite the prominence of non-visual semantic features for some words (e.g., siren or thunder), little is known about when and how the meanings of those words that refer to auditory objects can be acquired in early infancy. With associative learning being an important mechanism of word learning, we ask the question whether associations between sounds and words lead to similar learning effects as associations between visual objects and words. In an event-related potential (ERP) study, 10- to 12-month-old infants were presented with pairs of environmental sounds and pseudowords in either a consistent (where sound-word mapping can occur) or inconsistent manner. Subsequently, the infants were presented with sound-pseudoword combinations either matching or violating the consistent pairs from the training phase. In the training phase, we observed word-form familiarity effects and pairing consistency effects for ERPs time-locked to the onset of the word. The test phase revealed N400-like effects for violated pairs as compared to matching pairs. These results indicate that associative word learning is also possible for auditory objects before infants' first birthday. The specific temporal occurrence of the N400-like effect and topological distribution of the ERPs suggests that the object's modality has an impact on how novel words are processed.
Original languageEnglish
Article number100821
Number of pages10
JournalDevelopmental Cognitive Neuroscience
Volume45
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Oct 2020

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

  • 501030 Cognitive science
  • 501005 Developmental psychology

Keywords

  • Word learning
  • Associative learning
  • Event-related potential
  • EEG
  • Language acquisition
  • Auditory modality
  • EVENT-RELATED POTENTIALS
  • WORD LEARNING-ABILITY
  • 6-MONTH-OLD INFANTS
  • SENSORY DOMINANCE
  • CONTINUOUS SPEECH
  • BRAIN SIGNATURES
  • MATERNAL SPEECH
  • LANGUAGE
  • VOCABULARY
  • MEMORY

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