Pitch Processing in Tonal-Language-Speaking Children with Autism: An Event-Related Potential Study

Abstract

The present study investigated pitch processing in Mandarin-speaking children with autism using event-related potential measures. Two experiments were designed to test how acoustic, phonetic and semantic properties of the stimuli contributed to the neural responses for pitch change detection and involuntary attentional orienting. In comparison with age-matched (6-12 years) typically developing controls (16 participants in Experiment 1, 18 in Experiment 2), children with autism (18 participants in Experiment 1, 16 in Experiment 2) showed enhanced neural discriminatory sensitivity in the nonspeech conditions but not for speech stimuli. The results indicate domain specificity of enhanced pitch processing in autism, which may interfere with lexical tone acquisition and language development for children who speak a tonal language.

Effects of native language experience on Mandarin lexical tone processing in proficient second language learners

“…The new perspective also offers a testable approach for further verification of L2 speech learning models and the study of various contributors to the dynamic process of perceptual warping of acoustic and phonological information in the time course of L2 speech acquisition. The present study builds on previous studies on L2 learners (e.g., Hao, ; Wayland & Guion, ), native speakers (e.g., Wang et al, ; Xi et al, ; K. Yu et al, ; L. Yu et al, ), and nonnative listeners (e.g., Gandour et al, ; Klein, Zatorre, Milner, & Zhao, ; Wong, Parsons, Martinez, & Diehl, ), and we argue that L2 speech acquisition can be conceptualized as a dynamic process of fine‐tuning perceptual sensitivities to the acoustic and phonological information in the target L2 sound system. For the beginning stages, L2 learners may primarily process the L2 speech contrasts in an “acoustic” mode.…”

“…The present study builds on previous studies on L2 learners (e.g., Hao, 2012;Wayland & Guion, 2004), native speakers (e.g., Wang et al, 2017;Xi et al, 2010;K. Yu et al, 2014;L. Yu et al, 2015), and nonnative listeners (e.g., Gandour et al, 2004;Klein, Zatorre, Milner, & Zhao, 2001;Wong, Parsons, Martinez, & Diehl, 2004), and we argue that L2 speech acquisition can be conceptualized as a dynamic process of fine-tuning perceptual sensitivities to the acoustic and phonological information in the target L2 sound system.…”

Distinct patterns of discrimination and orienting for temporal processing of speech and nonspeech in Chinese children with autism: an event‐related potential study

“…In tonal languages, such as Chinese and Thai, pitch is used to differentiate word meaning at the syllabic level (Yip, ). Unlike the previously reported domain‐general pitch superiority in autism (Jarvinen‐Pasley & Heaton, ; Haesen et al ., ), Chinese‐speaking children with autism showed enhanced mismatch negativities (MMNs) to pitch contrasts in nonspeech stimuli but diminished responses to lexical tone differences (Yu et al ., ). The MMN reflects pre‐attentive automatic detection of acoustic stimulus change, which is correlated with perceptual discrimination ability (Näätänen et al ., ).…”

“…Despite their superior performance in melodic contour condition, children with autism showed impaired intonation perception compared with the TD controls (Jiang et al ., ). The co‐existence of ‘pitch superiority’ for nonspeech stimuli and language‐specific pitch processing deficit in Mandarin‐speaking children with autism appears to indicate NLNC abnormality for the higher‐order phonological processing of lexical tones (Yu et al ., ; Wang et al ., ). These results suggest domain‐specific pitch perception deficit in autism in relation to the tonal language background.…”

Individuals with autism have no detectable deficit in neural markers of prediction error when presented with auditory rhythms of varied temporal complexity

“…Of particular relevance to the deficits in language-based social interaction manifested by individuals with ASD, multiple aspects of auditory processing appear to be differentially affected in this population (O'Connor, 2012), including orientation and attention to speech and non-speech sounds (Ceponiene et al, 2003;M. A. Dunn, Gomes, & Gravel, 2008;Foxe et al, 2015;Huang et al, 2018;Kuhl, Coffey-Corina, Padden, & Dawson, 2005;Paul, Chawarska, Fowler, Cicchetti, & Volkmar, 2007;Teder-Salejarvi, Pierce, Courchesne, & Hillyard, 2005;Whitehouse & Bishop, 2008), discrimination of sound pitch and duration (Abdeltawwab & Baz, 2015;Chien, Hsieh, & Gau, 2018;Kujala et al, 2007;Lepisto et al, 2005;Lepisto et al, 2006;Novick, Vaughan, Kurtzberg, & Simson, 1980;Oades, Walker, Geffen, & Stern, 1988;Yu et al, 2015), sensitivity to volume (Khalfa et al, 2004), discrimination of auditory stimuli in the presence of noise (Teder-Salejarvi et al, 2005), processing of speech prosody (Fan & Cheng, 2014;Korpilahti et al, 2007;Kujala et al, 2010;Kujala, Lepisto, Nieminen-von Wendt, Naatanen, & Naatanen, 2005), and response to unexpected or deviant stimuli (Donkers et al, 2015;Ferri et al, 2003;Gomot et al, 2011;Gomot, Giard, Adrien, Barthelemy, & Bruneau, 2002;Hudac et al, 2018;Jansson-Verkasalo et al, 2003;Naatanen, Paavilainen, Rinne, & Alho, 2007;Roberts et al, 2011;Tecchio et al, 2003;Vlaskamp et al, 2017;…”