Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Electrophysiological Evidence for the Understanding of Maternal Speech by 9-Month-Old Infants. / Parise, Eugenio; Csibra, Gergely.
In: Psychological Science, Vol. 23, No. 7, 07.2012, p. 728-733.Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Electrophysiological Evidence for the Understanding of Maternal Speech by 9-Month-Old Infants
AU - Parise, Eugenio
AU - Csibra, Gergely
PY - 2012/7
Y1 - 2012/7
N2 - Early word learning in infants relies on statistical, prosodic, and social cues that support speech segmentation and the attachment of meaning to words. It is debated whether such early word knowledge represents mere associations between sound patterns and visual object features, or reflects referential understanding of words. By measuring an event-related brain potential component known as the N400, we demonstrated that 9-month-old infants can detect the mismatch between an object appearing from behind an occluder and a preceding label with which their mother introduces it. Differential N400 amplitudes have been shown to reflect semantic priming in adults, and its absence in infants has been interpreted as a sign of associative word learning. By setting up a live communicative situation for referring to objects, we demonstrated that a similar priming effect also occurs in young infants. This finding may indicate that word meaning is referential from the outset of word learning and that referential expectation drives, rather than results from, vocabulary acquisition in humans.
AB - Early word learning in infants relies on statistical, prosodic, and social cues that support speech segmentation and the attachment of meaning to words. It is debated whether such early word knowledge represents mere associations between sound patterns and visual object features, or reflects referential understanding of words. By measuring an event-related brain potential component known as the N400, we demonstrated that 9-month-old infants can detect the mismatch between an object appearing from behind an occluder and a preceding label with which their mother introduces it. Differential N400 amplitudes have been shown to reflect semantic priming in adults, and its absence in infants has been interpreted as a sign of associative word learning. By setting up a live communicative situation for referring to objects, we demonstrated that a similar priming effect also occurs in young infants. This finding may indicate that word meaning is referential from the outset of word learning and that referential expectation drives, rather than results from, vocabulary acquisition in humans.
KW - LANGUAGE
KW - GAZE
KW - OBJECTS
KW - semantic priming
KW - PICTURE CONTEXTS
KW - WORDS
KW - SEMANTIC INCONGRUITY
KW - NEWBORNS
KW - language development
KW - BRAIN
KW - priming
KW - language acquisition
KW - MOTHER
KW - infant development
KW - N400
KW - infants
KW - ERP
KW - REFERENTIAL NATURE
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84863919738&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0956797612438734
DO - 10.1177/0956797612438734
M3 - Journal article
VL - 23
SP - 728
EP - 733
JO - Psychological Science
JF - Psychological Science
SN - 0956-7976
IS - 7
ER -