Narrowing of intersensory speech perception in infancy

The conventional view is that perceptual/cognitive development is an incremental process of acquisition. Several striking findings have revealed, however, that the sensitivity to non-native languages, faces, vocalizations, and music that is present early in life declines as infants acquire experienc...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS 2009-06, Vol.106 (26), p.10598-10602
Main Authors: Pons, Ferran, Lewkowicz, David J, Soto-Faraco, Salvador, Sebastián-Gallés, Núria
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Age groups
Analysis of Variance
Auditory perception
Auditory Perception - physiology
Babies
Child Development - physiology
Choice Behavior - physiology
Cognition & reasoning
Experimentation
Female
Humans
Infancy
Infant
Infants
Language acquisition
Male
Musical rhythm
Native languages
Phonetics
Social Sciences
Speech Discrimination Tests - methods
Speech Perception - physiology
Syllables
Verbal Learning - physiology
Visual perception
Visual Perception - physiology
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Summary:The conventional view is that perceptual/cognitive development is an incremental process of acquisition. Several striking findings have revealed, however, that the sensitivity to non-native languages, faces, vocalizations, and music that is present early in life declines as infants acquire experience with native perceptual inputs. In the language domain, the decline in sensitivity is reflected in a process of perceptual narrowing that is thought to play a critical role during the acquisition of a native-language phonological system. Here, we provide evidence that such a decline also occurs in infant response to multisensory speech. We found that infant intersensory response to a non-native phonetic contrast narrows between 6 and 11 months of age, suggesting that the perceptual system becomes increasingly more tuned to key native-language audiovisual correspondences. Our findings lend support to the notion that perceptual narrowing is a domain-general as well as a pan-sensory developmental process.
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.0904134106