Neural mismatch indices of vowel discrimination in monolingually and bilingually exposed infants: Does attention matter?

Abstract

Neurophysiological studies of infant speech suggest that mismatch responses (MMRs) have predictive value for later language. Their value, however, is diminished because unexplained differences in the MMR patterns are seen across studies. The current study aimed to identify the functional nature of infant MMRs by recording event-related-potentials (ERPs) to an infrequent English vowel change in internal or final positions of a sequence of ten vowels in six-month-old monolingually- and bilingually-exposed infants. Increased negativity of the MMR (infrequent minus frequent) was found in final compared to internal positions and correlated with an index of increased attention to the final position. This pattern helps explain the overall greater negativity to the speech sounds in the bilingually-exposed female infants. These findings substantially advance our understanding of neural indices of speech perception development and show promise for furthering our understanding of bilingual language development.

Bilingualism and increased attention to speech: Evidence from event-related potentials

“…Although the functional significance of the P2 can vary substantially between experimental contexts, in both the auditory and visual perception literature it is often associated with target detection and classification, and it is modulated by attention (Crowley & Colrain, 2004;Luck & Hillyard, 1994). We interpreted the larger P2 response to a language-switch in bilinguals than monolinguals as an index of increased attention to speech in bilinguals, consistent with findings in six month-old bilinguals (Shafer, Yu, & Garrido-Nag, 2012).…”

The cognitive development of young dual language learners: A critical review

“…Four of these studies were conducted in United States with infants between 6 and 20 months, all being exposed to Spanish and English (Conboy & Mills, 2006; Conboy & Kuhl, 2011; Garcia-Sierra et al, 2011; Shafer, Yu, & Garrido-Nag, 2012). The remaining six studies were conducted in Japan (Japanese and English; Hidaka et al, 2012; Takahashi et al, 2011), United Kingdom (Welsh and English; Kuipers & Thierry, 2012), Canada (English in addition to French, Spanish, Chinese; Petitto et al, 2012), Germany (German and Turkish; Rinker, Alku, Brosch, & Kiefer, 2010) and Finland (Finnish and French; Shestakova, Huotilainen, Ceponiene, & Cheour, 2003).…”

Relationships between quantity of language input and brain responses in bilingual and monolingual infants

“…Researchers have agreed to describe the long latency infant MMN as the negative Mismatch Response (nMMR) and the positive MMN with early latency as the positive Mismatch Response (pMMR) in children (Friedrich, et al, 2004;Liu, eta la., 2014;Lee et al, 2012;Cheng et al, 2015;Shafer, Yu, & Garrido-Nag, 2012). The present investigation will use these labels going forward.…”