Roark Casey L, Thakkar Vishal, Chandrasekaran Bharath, Centanni Tracy M
Department of Communication Science and Disorders, University of Pittsburgh, PA.
Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition, University of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University, PA.
J Speech Lang Hear Res. 2024 Mar 11;67(3):974-988. doi: 10.1044/2023_JSLHR-23-00361. Epub 2024 Feb 14.
Developmental dyslexia is proposed to involve selective procedural memory deficits with intact declarative memory. Recent research in the domain of category learning has demonstrated that adults with dyslexia have selective deficits in Information-Integration (II) category learning that is proposed to rely on procedural learning mechanisms and unaffected Rule-Based (RB) category learning that is proposed to rely on declarative, hypothesis testing mechanisms. Importantly, learning mechanisms also change across development, with distinct developmental trajectories in both procedural and declarative learning mechanisms. It is unclear how dyslexia in childhood should influence auditory category learning, a critical skill for speech perception and reading development.
We examined auditory category learning performance and strategies in 7- to 12-year-old children with dyslexia ( = 25; nine females, 16 males) and typically developing controls ( = 25; 13 females, 12 males). Participants learned nonspeech auditory categories of spectrotemporal ripples that could be optimally learned with either RB selective attention to the temporal modulation dimension or procedural integration of information across spectral and temporal dimensions. We statistically compared performance using mixed-model analyses of variance and identified strategies using decision-bound computational models.
We found that children with dyslexia have an apparent selective RB category learning deficit, rather than a selective II learning deficit observed in prior work in adults with dyslexia.
These results suggest that the important skill of auditory category learning is impacted in children with dyslexia and throughout development, individuals with dyslexia may develop compensatory strategies that preserve declarative learning while developing difficulties in procedural learning.
发展性阅读障碍被认为涉及选择性程序记忆缺陷，而陈述性记忆完好。类别学习领域的最新研究表明，患有阅读障碍的成年人在信息整合（II）类别学习方面存在选择性缺陷，这种学习被认为依赖于程序学习机制；而基于规则（RB）的类别学习不受影响，这种学习被认为依赖于陈述性假设检验机制。重要的是，学习机制在整个发育过程中也会发生变化，程序学习和陈述性学习机制都有不同的发育轨迹。目前尚不清楚儿童期的阅读障碍如何影响听觉类别学习，而听觉类别学习是语音感知和阅读发展的一项关键技能。
我们研究了7至12岁患有阅读障碍的儿童（n = 25；9名女性，16名男性）和发育正常的对照组儿童（n = 25；13名女性，12名男性）的听觉类别学习表现和策略。参与者学习了非语音听觉类别的频谱时间波纹，这些类别可以通过对时间调制维度的RB选择性注意或跨频谱和时间维度的信息程序整合来最佳学习。我们使用方差混合模型分析对表现进行了统计比较，并使用决策边界计算模型确定了策略。
我们发现，患有阅读障碍的儿童存在明显的选择性RB类别学习缺陷，而不是先前在患有阅读障碍的成年人研究中观察到的选择性II学习缺陷。
这些结果表明听觉类别学习这项重要技能在患有阅读障碍的儿童中受到影响，并且在整个发育过程中，患有阅读障碍的个体可能会发展出补偿策略，在程序学习出现困难的同时保留陈述性学习。
