Auditive training effects from a dichotic listening app in children with dyslexia

Abstract

Dichotic listening (DL) taps information on the brain's language laterality, processing, and attention. Research has shown that DL responses in dyslexia deviate from the typical pattern. Here, effects of DL training and its correspondence to rapid naming (RAN) and digit span (DS) in typical children and children with dyslexia were assessed. Three groups of third graders participated: two training groups, control training (CT) and dyslexia training (DT), and a control group that received no training (control no training, CnT). All took part in testing pretraining and posttraining. DL measures were on laterality, response scores, and attention. The three groups showed different response patterns: minor changes in CnT, change in all measures in CT, and some changes in DT. RAN and DS scores correlated significantly with some of the DL measures, especially with the attention scores. Our findings support arguments that brain architecture for language in dyslexia is lateralised in the same way as in children without dyslexia. However, the ability to modulate attention during DL is weaker in dyslexia than in typically developing children. A training‐induced normalisation of lateralisation was observed in free recall in the dyslexia group, which suggests that DL training may be a promising intervention approach.

Paying Attention to Speech: The Role of Cognitive Capacity and Acquired Experience

“…Critically, the amenability of Selective auditory attention performance to training is not limited to these highly-selective groups. Improvement in Selective Attention performance has been demonstrated after a 4-week dichotic-listening training program in healthy adults (Soveri et al, 2013), and similar training effects have been reported in typically developing children (Murphy, Moore, & Schochat, 2015), as well as children with dyslexia (Helland et al, 2018). These findings point to the flexible nature of auditory Selective Attention, which can be improved through formal training programs and as well as frequent practice (Mishra, de Villers-Sidani, Merzenich, & Gazzaley, 2014).…”

Paying attention to speech: The role of working memory capacity and professional experience

“…Improvement in selective attention performance has been demonstrated after a 4-week dichotic-listening training program in healthy adults (Soveri et al, 2013), and similar training effects have been reported in typically developing children (C. F. B. Murphy, Moore, & Schochat, 2015), as well as children with dyslexia (Helland et al, 2018). Admittedly, in the current study we cannot exclude the possibility that the pilot's advantage on selective attention may not be solely due to their flight experience, and there may be additional non-flight-related differences between the groups (not captured by controlling for WMC and g factor).…”

An optimal dichotic-listening paradigm for the assessment of hemispheric dominance for speech processing

“…Verbal dichotic-listening paradigms offer well-established behavioral tests for the assessment of latent hemispheric differences for language processing [1,2] and are integral part of test procedures for the diagnosis of auditory processing disorders [3][4][5]. A significant advantage of dichotic compared with alternative paradigms (e.g., visual-half field techniques or neuroimaging approaches) is the simplicity of the testing procedure which can be easily understood and performed also by young children [e.g., 6,7], elderly individuals [e.g., 8,9], or patients with cognitive disabilities [e.g., 10,11]. That is, in its basic form, pairs of verbal stimuli (e.g., words or syllables) are presented via headphones, with one of the stimuli presented to the left ear and the other one, simultaneously, to the right ear [12].…”