CE28 - Cognition, éducation, formation

Perception de la parole et acquisition du vocabulaire chez les bébés – BABYLANG

Babylang aims to determine how the development of the encoding of speech sounds at the cortical and subcortical levels influence the emergence of conceptual representations in humans. To do so, we will evaluate the developmental dynamics of speech sound encoding and novel word learning abilities by longitudinally following full-term and moderate preterm infants during the first two years of their lives. The originality of the project is twofold. On the one hand, the analysis of cortical and subcortical responses in parallel will allow to better understand how the different structures of the auditory pathways communicate with each other in order to optimally encode the spectro-temporal characteristics of speech sounds. On the other hand, the longitudinal following of the same babies from birth until 24 months of age will provide unvaluable infornation about how such early encoding predicts language learning abilities at 2 years of age.

Because we obtained the ethical approval in March 2022, we were only able to start collecting data in newborns recently. This was one thanks to the collaboration of M. Beretti who made is Master 2 internship under my supervision. Despite the technical and operational challenge of gathering simultaneous cortical and sub-cortical activities, we were able to record and analyze legitimate responses such as the Frequency Following Response and the event-related brain potentials induced by CV syllables in 3 newborns.
Besides, thanks to the collaboration of Mme Tonellotto who made her Master 2 internship under my supervision, we were able to design and implement an eye-tracking experiment for 24 month-old babies. We obtained eye-tracking data during a word-learning paradigm in five preterms and seven 24 months-old fullterms. The preliminary results show that none of the 2 groups were able to learn the new word-picture associations calling for modifications of the experimental design.

This project will allow deciphering the hierarchy of human language learning mechanisms by bridging the gap between the early stages of speech perception in the first year of life and novel word learning later in life. Ultimately, this project will allow the definition of early predictors of subsequent linguistic deficits often observed in preterm children. The outcomes will have a major societal impact with a direct interest in basic research in cognitive neuroscience, clinical research as well as in the sciences of education.

1. Estelle Hervé, Giovanni Mento, Béatrice Desnous, Clément François. Challenges and new perspectives of developmental cognitive EEG studies. NeuroImage, Elsevier, 2022, pp.119508.
2. Guiomar Niso, Laurens R Krol, Etienne Combrisson, A Sophie Dubarry, Madison A Elliott, et al.. Good scientific practice in EEG and MEG research: Progress and perspectives. NeuroImage, Elsevier, 2022, 257, pp.119056.
3. Hervé, E., Dubarry, A-S., Legou, T., Beretti, T., Tonellotto, L., Desnous, B., François, C. (2022). Simultaneous cortical and sub-cortical brain responses to CV syllables, a planned study. Poster presented at the FFR Workshop 2022. 8-10 June 2022. Barcelona, Spain.

Résumé de soumission

Au cours de la première année de vie, les bébés deviennent de plus en plus sensibles aux propriétés phonologiques de leur langue maternelle. Naître prématurément peut avoir des conséquences dramatiques sur le développement linguistique des enfants menant souvent à une augmentation du risque d’échec scolaire. L’originalité du projet basé sur une large étude longitudinale combinée à différentes études transversales, réside dans le fait que nous étudierons la hiérarchie des apprentissages sous-tendant l’acquisition du langage chez des bébés nés à terme et prématurés. Ce projet permettra de mieux comprendre (i) les mécanismes de plasticité cérébrale sous-tendant l’émergence de catégories phonologiques, (ii) les liens entre perception précoce de la parole et capacités d’apprentissage de nouveaux mots, (iv) l’impact d’une naissance prématurée sur ces processus, et (iv) l’identification de biomarqueurs précoces des capacités linguistiques ultérieures.

Coordination du projet

Clément François (Laboratoire Parole et Langage)

L'auteur de ce résumé est le coordinateur du projet, qui est responsable du contenu de ce résumé. L'ANR décline par conséquent toute responsabilité quant à son contenu.

Partenaire

LPL Laboratoire Parole et Langage

Aide de l'ANR 259 819 euros
Début et durée du projet scientifique : mars 2021 - 48 Mois

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