Neurofunctional basis underlying audiovisual integration of print and speech sound in Chinese children

Xia, Zhichao; Yang, Ting; Cui, Xiaowei; Hoeft, Fumiko; H, Liu; Hu, Shu; Liu, Xiaoyu

doi:10.1101/2020.05.31.126128

Cited by 5 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 88 publications

(222 reference statements)

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“…One interesting point should be noted that spatially very close but not overlapping clusters were found in the rSTG across any pairs of writing systems (Chi-W ⋂ Eng-W, rSTG, [60, −20, −10]; Chi-W ⋂ Pin, rSTG, [70, −16, −8]; Pin ⋂ Eng-W, rSTG, [66, −26, −6]). Previous studies demonstrated that the bilateral STG was involved in visual-audio integration both in English and Chinese reading (Holloway, van Atteveldt, Blomert, & Ansari, 2015; Kast, Bezzola, Jancke, & Meyer, 2011; McNorgan, Randazzo-Wagner, & Booth, 2013; Xia, 2020). Subtle anatomical separations supporting similar functions suggested that discrepant visual-audio linguistic features were integrated in subregions of the rSTG and supported the accommodation hypothesis.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cortical encoding during word reading in bilinguals: parallel interdigitated distributed networks support convergent linguistic functioning

Geng

Guo

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Word reading includes a series of cognitive processes that convert low-level visual characteristics to neural representations. However, the consistency of the neural mechanisms for processing these cognitive components across different writing systems in bilinguals remains inconclusive. Here, we explored this question by employing representational similarity analysis with a semantic access task involving Chinese words, English words and Chinese pinyin. Divergent spatial distribution patterns were detected for each type of brain representation across ideographic and alphabetic languages, resulting in 100% classification accuracy. Meanwhile, convergent cognitive components processing was found in the core language-related regions in left hemisphere, including the inferior frontal gyrus, temporal pole, superior and middle temporal gyrus, precentral gyrus and supplementary motor areas. Broadly, our findings indicated that the neural basis for word recognition of different writing systems in bilinguals was divergent in spatial locations of neural representations but convergent in functions, which supported and enriched the assimilation-accommodation hypothesis.TeaserCortical encoding of processing components across languages was divergent in fine spatial locations but convergent in cognitive functions.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cortical encoding during word reading in bilinguals: parallel interdigitated distributed networks support convergent linguistic functioning

Geng

Guo

et al. 2021

Preprint

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“…This study adopted a passive audiovisual paradigm that has been widely used in the previous fMRI studies investigating the neural basis of letter-sound integration (Figure 1). The details about the stimuli and procedure can be found in Xia et al (2020). In brief, 56 pictographic characters with high-frequency (M ± SD = 929 ± 1486 per million; Chinese Single-Character Word Database; https://blclab.org/pyscholinguistic-norms-database/; Liu et al, 2007) and are frequently used as radicals in phonograms were selected.…”

Section: Experimental Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Both group comparison and individual differences analytic approaches were performed. Based on the prior research in typically developing children (Xia et al, 2020), we predicted that Chinese children with dyslexia would show a reduced audiovisual integration effect. In addition, dyslexic children may also display atypical brain-behavior correlations or recruit other brain regions to integrate cross-modal information.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This anomaly was driven by hypo-activation in the congruent condition along with hyper-activation in the incongruent condition in dyslexia, indicating reduced neural integration and lack of suppression, respectively. In terms of orthographic depth, investigations were administered with Chinese adults (Xu, Kolozsvari, Oostenveld, Leppanen, & Hamalainen, 2019) and typically developing children recently (Xia et al, 2020). In particular, Xia et al (2020) used Chinese characters and pinyin (a transparent alphabetic coding system that represents the pronunciation of characters, which is taught at the earliest stage of Chinese reading development and used as a scaffold in learning new characters) as experimental materials and observed a significant audiovisual integration effect in the direction of "congruent < incongruent" in the left inferior frontal cortex (IFC) and bilateral STC in processing character-sound associations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In terms of orthographic depth, investigations were administered with Chinese adults (Xu, Kolozsvari, Oostenveld, Leppanen, & Hamalainen, 2019) and typically developing children recently (Xia et al, 2020). In particular, Xia et al (2020) used Chinese characters and pinyin (a transparent alphabetic coding system that represents the pronunciation of characters, which is taught at the earliest stage of Chinese reading development and used as a scaffold in learning new characters) as experimental materials and observed a significant audiovisual integration effect in the direction of "congruent < incongruent" in the left inferior frontal cortex (IFC) and bilateral STC in processing character-sound associations. Moreover, neural integration in the left IFC in response to character-sound pairs and that in the left STC in response to pinyin-sound pairs were associated with children's performance in silent reading comprehension that relies on grapho-semantic mapping and oral word reading fluency that relies on grapho-phonological processing, respectively.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Atypical relationships between neurofunctional features of print-sound integration and reading abilities in Chinese children with dyslexia

Xia

Yang

Cui

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Conquering grapheme-phoneme correspondence is necessary for developing fluent reading in alphabetic orthographies. In neuroimaging research, this ability is associated with brain activation differences between the audiovisual congruent against incongruent conditions, especially in the left superior temporal cortex. Studies have also shown such a neural audiovisual integration effect is reduced in individuals with dyslexia. However, existing evidence is almost restricted to alphabetic languages. Whether and how multisensory processing of print and sound is impaired in Chinese dyslexia remains underexplored. Of note, semantic information is deeply involved in Chinese character processing. In this study, we applied a functional magnetic resonance imaging audiovisual integration paradigm to investigate the possible dysfunctions in processing character-sound pairs and pinyin-sound pairs in Chinese dyslexic children compared with typically developing readers. Unexpectedly, no region displayed significant group difference in the audiovisual integration effect in either the character or pinyin experiment. However, the results revealed atypical correlations between neurofunctional features accompanying audiovisual integration with reading abilities in Chinese children with dyslexia. Specifically, while the audiovisual integration effect in the left inferior cortex in processing character-sound pairs correlated with silent reading comprehension proficiency in both dyslexia and control group, it was associated with morphological awareness in the control group but with rapid naming in dyslexics. As for pinyin-sound associations processing, while the stronger activation in the congruent than incongruent conditions in the left occipito-temporal cortex and bilateral superior temporal cortices was associated with better oral word reading in the control group, an opposite pattern was found in children with dyslexia. On the one hand, this pattern suggests Chinese dyslexic children have yet to develop an efficient grapho-semantic processing system as typically developing children do. On the other hand, it indicates dysfunctional recruitment of the regions that process pinyin-sound pairs in dyslexia, which may impede character learning.HighlightsNeural bases of print-sound integration in Chinese children with and without dyslexia are investigated.Dyslexia shows atypical relationships between neurofunctional features of audiovisual integration in the reading network and different aspects of reading.Chinese children with dyslexia are likely to use inefficient strategies to process characters and pinyin.

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Intersecting distributed networks support convergent linguistic functioning across different languages in bilinguals

et al. 2023

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How bilingual brains accomplish the processing of more than one language has been widely investigated by neuroimaging studies. The assimilation-accommodation hypothesis holds that both the same brain neural networks supporting the native language and additional new neural networks are utilized to implement second language processing. However, whether and how this hypothesis applies at the finer-grained levels of both brain anatomical organization and linguistic functions remains unknown. To address this issue, we scanned Chinese-English bilinguals during an implicit reading task involving Chinese words, English words and Chinese pinyin. We observed broad brain cortical regions wherein interdigitated distributed neural populations supported the same cognitive components of different languages. Although spatially separate, regions including the opercular and triangular parts of the inferior frontal gyrus, temporal pole, superior and middle temporal gyrus, precentral gyrus and supplementary motor areas were found to perform the same linguistic functions across languages, indicating regional-level functional assimilation supported by voxel-wise anatomical accommodation. Taken together, the findings not only verify the functional independence of neural representations of different languages, but show co-representation organization of both languages in most language regions, revealing linguistic-feature specific accommodation and assimilation between first and second languages.

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Neurofunctional basis underlying audiovisual integration of print and speech sound in Chinese children

Cited by 5 publications

References 88 publications

Cortical encoding during word reading in bilinguals: parallel interdigitated distributed networks support convergent linguistic functioning

Cortical encoding during word reading in bilinguals: parallel interdigitated distributed networks support convergent linguistic functioning

Atypical relationships between neurofunctional features of print-sound integration and reading abilities in Chinese children with dyslexia

Intersecting distributed networks support convergent linguistic functioning across different languages in bilinguals

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