Knowland Victoria C P, Baker Daniel H, Gaskell M Gareth, van Rijn Elaine, Walker Sarah A, Norbury Courtenay F, Henderson Lisa-Marie
Department of Psychology, University of York, York, YO10 5DD, UK.
Psychology and Language Sciences, University College London, UK.
J Cogn. 2022 Jan 27;5(1):14. doi: 10.5334/joc.204. eCollection 2022.
The formation of new phonological representations is key in establishing items in the mental lexicon. Phonological forms become stable with repetition, time and sleep. Atypicality in the establishment of new word forms is characteristic of children with developmental language disorder (DLD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD), yet neural changes in response to novel word forms over time have not yet been directly compared in these groups. This study measured habituation of event-related-potentials (ERPs) to novel and known words within and between two sessions spaced 24 hours apart in typically developing (TD) children, and their peers with DLD or ASD. We hypothesised that modulation of the auditory N400 amplitude would mark real-time changes in lexical processing with habituation evident within and across sessions in the TD group, while the DLD group would show attenuated habituation within sessions, and the ASD group attenuated habituation between sessions. Twenty-one typically developing children, 19 children with ASD, and 16 children with DLD listened passively to known and novel words on two consecutive days, while ERPs were recorded using dry electrodes. Counter to our hypotheses, no habituation effect emerged within sessions. However, responses did habituate between sessions, with this effect being reduced in the DLD group, indicating less pre-activation of lexical representations in response to words encountered the previous day. No differences in change over time were observed between the TD and ASD groups. These data are in keeping with theories stressing the importance of sleep-related consolidation in word learning.
新语音表征的形成是在心理词典中确立词条的关键。语音形式会随着重复、时间和睡眠而变得稳定。发育性语言障碍（DLD）儿童和自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）儿童在建立新单词形式方面具有非典型性，但尚未直接比较过这些群体对新单词形式随时间的神经反应变化。本研究测量了在间隔24小时的两个时段内，发育正常（TD）儿童及其患有DLD或ASD的同龄人对新单词和已知单词的事件相关电位（ERP）的习惯化情况。我们假设，听觉N400振幅的调制将标志着词汇加工的实时变化，TD组在时段内和时段间都会出现明显的习惯化，而DLD组在时段内的习惯化会减弱，ASD组在时段间的习惯化会减弱。21名发育正常的儿童、19名患有ASD的儿童和16名患有DLD的儿童连续两天被动聆听已知和新单词，同时使用干电极记录ERP。与我们的假设相反，时段内未出现习惯化效应。然而，时段间的反应确实出现了习惯化，DLD组的这种效应有所降低，表明对前一天遇到的单词的词汇表征的预激活较少。TD组和ASD组在随时间的变化上没有观察到差异。这些数据与强调睡眠相关巩固在单词学习中的重要性的理论一致。
