Bonacina Silvia, Huang Stephanie, White-Schwoch Travis, Krizman Jennifer, Nicol Trent, Kraus Nina
Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA.
Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA.
NPJ Sci Learn. 2021 Jun 29;6(1):20. doi: 10.1038/s41539-021-00097-5.
A child's success in school relies on their ability to quickly grasp language and reading skills, the foundations of which are acquired even before entering a formal classroom setting. Previous studies in preschoolers have begun to establish relationships linking beat synchronization, preliteracy skills, and auditory processing. Beat synchronization involves the integration of sensorimotor systems with auditory and cognitive circuits and, therefore calls on many of the same neural networks as language. Using a drumming task, we analyzed the relationship between children's ability to maintain an isochronous beat with preliteracy skills and frequency following responses (FFRs) in over 150 preschoolers. We show that preschoolers who performed well on the beat synchronization task outscored their peers on all preliteracy measures and had more robust FFRs. Furthermore, the good synchronizers experienced less degradation of certain FFR measures when listening in noise. Together, our results are consistent with the view that rhythm, preliteracy, and auditory processing are interconnected during early childhood.
孩子在学校的成功依赖于他们快速掌握语言和阅读技能的能力，而这些技能的基础甚至在进入正式课堂之前就已习得。先前针对学龄前儿童的研究已开始建立起节拍同步、读写前技能和听觉处理之间的联系。节拍同步涉及感觉运动系统与听觉及认知回路的整合，因此需要调用许多与语言相同的神经网络。我们采用击鼓任务，分析了150多名学龄前儿童维持等时节拍的能力与读写前技能及频率跟随反应（FFR）之间的关系。我们发现，在节拍同步任务中表现出色的学龄前儿童在所有读写前技能测试中得分都高于同龄人，并且具有更强健的FFR。此外，在噪声环境中聆听时，节拍同步良好的儿童某些FFR测量值的衰减较小。总之，我们的研究结果与以下观点一致：在幼儿期，节奏、读写前技能和听觉处理是相互关联的。
