Kraus N, McGee T, Carrell T, Sharma A, Micco A, Nicol T
Department of Communication Sciences, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208.
J Am Acad Audiol. 1993 Jul;4(4):238-48.
Event-related potentials (ERPs) were obtained to synthesized speech stimuli in 16 school-aged children (7-11 years) and compared to responses in 10 adults. P1, N1, and P2 event-related potentials were elicited by the phoneme /ga/. The mismatch negativity (MMN) was elicited by variants of /da/ and /ga/, which differ in the onset frequency of the second and third formant transitions. In general, the well-defined N1/P2 complex characteristic of the adult response, was not found in children. Waves P1 and N1 had longer peak latencies in children than in adults. Wave P2 amplitude was smaller in children than in adults. In contrast to the often poorly delineated earlier cortical potentials, the MMN was well defined in children. Significant MMNs were obtained in all subjects tested. MMN magnitude (peak amplitude and area) was significantly larger in the children. No significant differences were found in peak latency and duration of the MMN in children compared to the adult response. Another negative wave occurring at 400 msec was also observed in response to the deviant stimuli. This negative wave occurred at a similar latency in adults and children and was significantly larger and more robust in children. Results support the view that development of ERPs does not involve a hierarchical process with respect to latency. That is, earlier occurring waves do not necessarily mature before later occurring waves. The latencies of P1, N1, and P2 and overall morphology of these waves may provide a measure of maturation of central pathways. The early development of the MMN, its apparent robustness in school-aged children, and its reflection of the processing of acoustic differences in speech stimuli suggest its possible use in the assessment of central auditory function.
对16名学龄儿童（7至11岁）的合成语音刺激进行了事件相关电位（ERP）检测，并与10名成年人的反应进行了比较。音素/ga/诱发了P1、N1和P2事件相关电位。/da/和/ga/的变体诱发了失匹配负波（MMN），这两个音素在第二和第三共振峰转换的起始频率上有所不同。总体而言，在儿童中未发现成人反应中典型的明确的N1/P2复合波。儿童的P1波和N1波的峰值潜伏期比成年人长。儿童的P2波幅比成年人小。与早期皮层电位通常难以清晰区分不同，MMN在儿童中很明确。所有受试对象均获得了显著的MMN。儿童的MMN幅度（峰值幅度和面积）明显更大。与成人反应相比，儿童的MMN在峰值潜伏期和持续时间上没有显著差异。在对偏差刺激的反应中还观察到另一个在400毫秒出现的负波。这个负波在成年人和儿童中的潜伏期相似，在儿童中明显更大且更稳定。结果支持这样一种观点，即ERP的发展在潜伏期方面不涉及分层过程。也就是说，较早出现的波不一定比较晚出现的波先成熟。P1、N1和P2的潜伏期以及这些波的整体形态可能提供了中枢通路成熟度的一种衡量方法。MMN的早期发展及其在学龄儿童中明显的稳定性，以及它对语音刺激中声学差异处理的反映，表明它可能用于评估中枢听觉功能。
