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Kampis D, Askitis D, Poulsen E, Parise E, Southgate V. 14-month-old infants detect a semantic mismatch when occluded objects are mislabeled. INFANCY 2024; 29:510-524. [PMID: 38687625 DOI: 10.1111/infa.12597] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/26/2023] [Revised: 12/20/2023] [Accepted: 04/16/2024] [Indexed: 05/02/2024]
Abstract
When infants start mastering their first language, they may start to notice when words are used incorrectly. Around 14-months of age, infants detect incorrect labeling when they are presented with an object which is labeled while still visible. However, things that are referred to are often out of sight when we communicate about them. The present study examined infants' detection of semantic mismatch when the object was occluded at the time of labeling. Specifically, we investigated whether mislabeling that referred to an occluded object could elicit a semantic mismatch. We showed 14-month-old Danish-speaking infants events where an onscreen agent showed an object and then hid it in a box. This was followed by another agent's hand pointing at the box, and a concurrent auditory category label played, which either matched or did not match the hidden object. Our results indicate that there is an effect of semantic mismatch with a larger negativity in incongruent trials. Thus, infants detected a mismatch, as indicated by a larger n400, when occluded objects were mislabeled. This finding suggests that infants can sustain an object representation in memory and compare it to a semantic representation of an auditory category label.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dora Kampis
- University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | | | | | - Eugenio Parise
- CIMeC - Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, University of Trento, Trento, Italy
- Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK
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2
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Forgács B. Meaning as mentalization. Front Hum Neurosci 2024; 18:1384116. [PMID: 38855407 PMCID: PMC11158629 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2024.1384116] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/08/2024] [Accepted: 05/02/2024] [Indexed: 06/11/2024] Open
Abstract
The way we establish meaning has been a profound question not only in language research but in developmental science as well. The relation between linguistic form and content has been loosened up in recent pragmatic approaches to communication, showing that code-based models of language comprehension must be augmented by context-sensitive, pragmatic-inferential mechanisms to recover the speaker's intended meaning. Language acquisition has traditionally been thought to involve building a mental lexicon and extracting syntactic rules from noisy linguistic input, while communicative-pragmatic inferences have also been argued to be indispensable. Recent research findings exploring the electrophysiological indicator of semantic processing, the N400, have raised serious questions about the traditional separation between semantic decoding and pragmatic inferential processes. The N400 appears to be sensitive to mentalization-the ability to attribute beliefs to social partners-already from its developmental onset. This finding raises the possibility that mentalization may not simply contribute to pragmatic inferences that enrich linguistic decoding processes but that the semantic system may be functioning in a fundamentally mentalistic manner. The present review first summarizes the key contributions of pragmatic models of communication to language comprehension. Then, it provides an overview of how communicative intentions are interpreted in developmental theories of communication, with a special emphasis on mentalization. Next, it discusses the sensitivity of infants to the information-transmitting potential of language, their ability to pick up its code-like features, and their capacity to track language comprehension of social partners using mentalization. In conclusion, I argue that the recovery of meaning during linguistic communication is not adequately modeled as a process of code-based semantic retrieval complemented by pragmatic inferences. Instead, the semantic system may establish meaning, as intended, during language comprehension and acquisition through mentalistic attribution of content to communicative partners.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bálint Forgács
- Department of Experimental and Neurocognitive Psychology, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany
- Department of Cognitive Psychology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
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3
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Woo BM, Chisholm GH, Spelke ES. Do toddlers reason about other people's experiences of objects? A limit to early mental state reasoning. Cognition 2024; 246:105760. [PMID: 38447359 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2024.105760] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/30/2022] [Revised: 01/09/2024] [Accepted: 02/24/2024] [Indexed: 03/08/2024]
Abstract
Human social life requires an understanding of the mental states of one's social partners. Two people who look at the same objects often experience them differently, as a twinkling light or a planet, a 6 or a 9, and a random cat or Cleo, their pet. Indeed, a primary purpose of communication is to share distinctive experiences of objects or events. Here, we test whether toddlers (14-15 months) are sensitive to another agent's distinctive experiences of pictures when determining the goal underlying the agent's actions in a minimally social context. We conducted nine experiments. Across seven of these experiments (n = 206), toddlers viewed either videotaped or live events in which an actor, whose perspective differed from their own, reached (i) for pictures of human faces that were upright or inverted or (ii) for pictures that depicted a rabbit or a duck at different orientations. Then either the actor or the toddler moved to a new location that aligned their perspectives, and the actor alternately reached to each of the two pictures. By comparing toddlers' looking to the latter reaches, we tested whether their goal attributions accorded with the actor's experience of the pictured objects, with their own experience of the pictured objects, or with no consistency. In no experiment did toddlers encode the actor's goal in accord with his experiences of the pictures. In contrast, in a similar experiment that manipulated the visibility of a picture rather than the experience that it elicited, toddlers (n = 32) correctly expected the actor's action to depend on what was visible and occluded to him, rather than to themselves. In a verbal version of the tasks, older children (n = 35) correctly inferred the actor's goal in both cases. These findings provide further evidence for a dissociation between two kinds of mental state reasoning: When toddlers view an actor's object-directed action under minimally social conditions, they take account of the actor's visual access to the object but not the actor's distinctive experience of the object.
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Affiliation(s)
- Brandon M Woo
- Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, United States; The Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines, Cambridge, MA 02139, United States.
| | - Gabriel H Chisholm
- Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, United States; The Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines, Cambridge, MA 02139, United States
| | - Elizabeth S Spelke
- Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, United States; The Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines, Cambridge, MA 02139, United States
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4
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Eleőd H, Gácsi M, Bunford N, Kis A. Event-related potentials indicate differential neural reactivity to species and valence information in vocal stimuli in sleeping dogs. Sci Rep 2023; 13:14518. [PMID: 37666838 PMCID: PMC10477275 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-40851-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/16/2023] [Accepted: 08/16/2023] [Indexed: 09/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Dogs live in a complex social environment where they regularly interact with conspecific and heterospecific partners. Awake dogs are able to process a variety of information based on vocalisations emitted by dogs and humans. Whether dogs are also able to process such information while asleep, is unknown. In the current explorative study, we investigated in N = 13 family dogs, neural response to conspecific and human emotional vocalisations. Data were recorded while dogs were asleep, using a fully non-invasive event-related potential (ERP) paradigm. A species (between 250-450 and 600-800 ms after stimulus onset) and a species by valence interaction (between 550 to 650 ms after stimulus onset) effect was observed during drowsiness. A valence (750-850 ms after stimulus onset) and a species x valence interaction (between 200 to 300 ms and 450 to 650 ms after stimulus onset) effect was also observed during non-REM specific at the Cz electrode. Although further research is needed, these results not only suggest that dogs neurally differentiate between differently valenced con- and heterospecific vocalisations, but they also provide the first evidence of complex vocal processing during sleep in dogs. Assessment and detection of ERPs during sleep in dogs appear feasible.
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Affiliation(s)
- Huba Eleőd
- Department of Ethology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary.
- Doctoral School of Biology, Institute of Biology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary.
| | - Márta Gácsi
- Department of Ethology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
- ELKH-ELTE Comparative Ethology Research Group, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Nóra Bunford
- ELKH-ELTE Comparative Ethology Research Group, Budapest, Hungary
- Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Clinical and Developmental Neuropsychology Research Group, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Anna Kis
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary, Budapest, Hungary
- ELTE-ELKH NAP Comparative Ethology Research group, Budapest, Hungary
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5
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Sander-Montant A, López Pérez M, Byers-Heinlein K. The more they hear the more they learn? Using data from bilinguals to test models of early lexical development. Cognition 2023; 238:105525. [PMID: 37402336 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2023.105525] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/13/2022] [Revised: 05/19/2023] [Accepted: 06/10/2023] [Indexed: 07/06/2023]
Abstract
Children have an early ability to learn and comprehend words, a skill that develops as they age. A critical question remains regarding what drives this development. Maturation-based theories emphasise cognitive maturity as a driver of comprehension, while accumulator theories emphasise children's accumulation of language experience over time. In this study we used archival looking-while-listening data from 155 children aged 14-48 months with a range of exposure to the target languages (from 10% to 100%) to evaluate the relative contributions of maturation and experience. We compared four statistical models of noun learning: maturation-only, experience-only, additive (maturation plus experience), and accumulator (maturation times experience). The best-fitting model was the additive model in which both maturation (age) and experience were independent contributors to noun comprehension: older children as well as children who had more experience with the target language were more accurate and looked faster to the target in the looking-while-listening task. A 25% change in relative language exposure was equivalent to a 4 month change in age, and age effects were stronger at younger than at older ages. Whereas accumulator models predict that the lexical development of children with less exposure to a language (as is typical in bilinguals) should fall further and further behind children with more exposure to a language (such as monolinguals), our results indicate that bilinguals are buffered against effects of reduced exposure in each language. This study shows that continuous-level measures from individual children's looking-while-listening data, gathered from children with a range of language experience, provide a powerful window into lexical development.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrea Sander-Montant
- Concordia Infant Research Lab, Department of Psychology, Concordia University (Canada), 7141 Sherbrooke St. West, PY-033, Montréal, Québec H4B 1R6, Canada.
| | - Melanie López Pérez
- Concordia Infant Research Lab, Department of Psychology, Concordia University (Canada), 7141 Sherbrooke St. West, PY-033, Montréal, Québec H4B 1R6, Canada.
| | - Krista Byers-Heinlein
- Concordia Infant Research Lab, Department of Psychology, Concordia University (Canada), 7141 Sherbrooke St. West, PY-033, Montréal, Québec H4B 1R6, Canada.
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6
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Kibbe MM, Stahl AE. Objects in a social world: Infants' object representational capacity limits are shaped by objects' social relevance. ADVANCES IN CHILD DEVELOPMENT AND BEHAVIOR 2023; 65:69-97. [PMID: 37481301 DOI: 10.1016/bs.acdb.2023.05.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 07/24/2023]
Abstract
Several decades of research have revealed consistent signature limits on infants' ability to represent objects. However, these signature representational limits were established with methods that often removed objects from their most common context. In infants' everyday lives, objects are very often social artifacts: they are the targets of agents' goal-directed actions, communications, and beliefs, and may have social content or relevance themselves. In this chapter, we explore the relationship between infants' object representational capacity limits and their processing of the social world. We review evidence that the social content and context of objects can shift infants' object representational limits. We discuss how taking the social world into account can yield more robust and ecologically valid estimates of infants' early representational capacities.
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Affiliation(s)
- Melissa M Kibbe
- Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Boston University, Boston, MA, United States.
| | - Aimee E Stahl
- Department of Psychology, The College of New Jersey, Ewing, NJ, United States
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7
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Carruthers P, Williams DM. Model-free metacognition. Cognition 2022; 225:105117. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2022.105117] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/30/2021] [Revised: 03/25/2022] [Accepted: 03/31/2022] [Indexed: 01/08/2023]
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8
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Bálint A, Eleőd H, Magyari L, Kis A, Gácsi M. Differences in dogs' event-related potentials in response to human and dog vocal stimuli; a non-invasive study. ROYAL SOCIETY OPEN SCIENCE 2022; 9:211769. [PMID: 35401994 PMCID: PMC8984299 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.211769] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/10/2021] [Accepted: 01/31/2022] [Indexed: 05/03/2023]
Abstract
Recent advances in the field of canine neuro-cognition allow for the non-invasive research of brain mechanisms in family dogs. Considering the striking similarities between dog's and human (infant)'s socio-cognition at the behavioural level, both similarities and differences in neural background can be of particular relevance. The current study investigates brain responses of n = 17 family dogs to human and conspecific emotional vocalizations using a fully non-invasive event-related potential (ERP) paradigm. We found that similarly to humans, dogs show a differential ERP response depending on the species of the caller, demonstrated by a more positive ERP response to human vocalizations compared to dog vocalizations in a time window between 250 and 650 ms after stimulus onset. A later time window between 800 and 900 ms also revealed a valence-sensitive ERP response in interaction with the species of the caller. Our results are, to our knowledge, the first ERP evidence to show the species sensitivity of vocal neural processing in dogs along with indications of valence sensitive processes in later post-stimulus time periods.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anna Bálint
- MTA-ELTE Comparative Ethology Research Group, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Ethology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Huba Eleőd
- Department of Ethology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
- Doctoral School of Biology, Institute of Biology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Lilla Magyari
- MTA-ELTE ‘Lendület’ Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Social Studies, University of Stavanger, Stavanger, Norway
| | - Anna Kis
- Department of Ethology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences,Budapest, Hungary
| | - Márta Gácsi
- MTA-ELTE Comparative Ethology Research Group, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Ethology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
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9
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Semantic systems are mentalistically activated for and by social partners. Sci Rep 2022; 12:4866. [PMID: 35318349 PMCID: PMC8941134 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-08306-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/08/2021] [Accepted: 03/03/2022] [Indexed: 11/17/2022] Open
Abstract
A recently discovered electrophysiological response, the social N400, suggests that we use our language system to track how social partners comprehend language. Listeners show an increased N400 response, when themselves not, only a communicative partner experiences a semantic incongruity. Does the N400 reflect purely semantic or mentalistic computations as well? Do we attribute language comprehension to communicative partners using our semantic systems? In five electrophysiological experiments we identified two subcomponents of the social N400. First, we manipulated the presence-absence of an Observer during object naming: the semantic memory system was activated by the presence of a social partner in addition to semantic predictions for the self. Next, we induced a false belief—and a consequent miscomprehension—in the Observer. Participants showed the social N400, over and above the social presence effect, to labels that were incongruent for the Observer, even though they were congruent for them. This effect appeared only if participants received explicit instructions to track the comprehension of the Observer. These findings suggest that the semantic systems of the brain are not merely sensitive to social information and contribute to the attribution of comprehension, but they appear to be mentalistic in nature.
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10
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Boros M, Magyari L, Török D, Bozsik A, Deme A, Andics A. Neural processes underlying statistical learning for speech segmentation in dogs. Curr Biol 2021; 31:5512-5521.e5. [PMID: 34717832 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.10.017] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/01/2021] [Revised: 07/23/2021] [Accepted: 10/07/2021] [Indexed: 10/20/2022]
Abstract
To learn words, humans extract statistical regularities from speech. Multiple species use statistical learning also to process speech, but the neural underpinnings of speech segmentation in non-humans remain largely unknown. Here, we investigated computational and neural markers of speech segmentation in dogs, a phylogenetically distant mammal that efficiently navigates humans' social and linguistic environment. Using electroencephalography (EEG), we compared event-related responses (ERPs) for artificial words previously presented in a continuous speech stream with different distributional statistics. Results revealed an early effect (220-470 ms) of transitional probability and a late component (590-790 ms) modulated by both word frequency and transitional probability. Using fMRI, we searched for brain regions sensitive to statistical regularities in speech. Structured speech elicited lower activity in the basal ganglia, a region involved in sequence learning, and repetition enhancement in the auditory cortex. Speech segmentation in dogs, similar to that of humans, involves complex computations, engaging both domain-general and modality-specific brain areas. VIDEO ABSTRACT.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marianna Boros
- MTA-ELTE "Lendület" Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary; Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary.
| | - Lilla Magyari
- MTA-ELTE "Lendület" Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary; Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary; Norwegian Reading Centre for Reading Education and Research, Faculty of Arts and Education, University of Stavanger, Professor Olav Hanssens vei 10, 4036 Stavanger, Norway
| | - Dávid Török
- MTA-ELTE "Lendület" Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary; Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary
| | - Anett Bozsik
- MTA-ELTE "Lendület" Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary; Department of Anatomy and Histology, University of Veterinary Medicine, 1078 Budapest, István utca 2, Hungary
| | - Andrea Deme
- Department of Applied Linguistics and Phonetics, Eötvös Loránd University, 1088 Budapest, Múzeum krt. 4/A, Hungary; MTA-ELTE "Lendület" Lingual Articulation Research Group, 1088 Budapest, Múzeum krt. 4/A, Hungary
| | - Attila Andics
- MTA-ELTE "Lendület" Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary; Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University, 1117 Budapest, Pázmány Péter sétány 1/C, Hungary.
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11
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Meylan SC, Bergelson E. Learning Through Processing: Toward an Integrated Approach to Early Word Learning. ANNUAL REVIEW OF LINGUISTICS 2021; 8:77-99. [PMID: 35481110 PMCID: PMC9037961 DOI: 10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031220-011146] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/14/2023]
Abstract
Children's linguistic knowledge and the learning mechanisms by which they acquire it grow substantially in infancy and toddlerhood, yet theories of word learning largely fail to incorporate these shifts. Moreover, researchers' often-siloed focus on either familiar word recognition or novel word learning limits the critical consideration of how these two relate. As a step toward a mechanistic theory of language acquisition, we present a framework of "learning through processing" and relate it to the prevailing methods used to assess children's early knowledge of words. Incorporating recent empirical work, we posit a specific, testable timeline of qualitative changes in the learning process in this interval. We conclude with several challenges and avenues for building a comprehensive theory of early word learning: better characterization of the input, reconciling results across approaches, and treating lexical knowledge in the nascent grammar with sufficient sophistication to ensure generalizability across languages and development.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stephan C Meylan
- Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
| | - Elika Bergelson
- Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
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12
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Junge C, Boumeester M, Mills DL, Paul M, Cosper SH. Development of the N400 for Word Learning in the First 2 Years of Life: A Systematic Review. Front Psychol 2021; 12:689534. [PMID: 34276518 PMCID: PMC8277998 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.689534] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/01/2021] [Accepted: 05/27/2021] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The N400 ERP component is a direct neural index of word meaning. Studies show that the N400 component is already present in early infancy, albeit often delayed. Many researchers capitalize on this finding, using the N400 component to better understand how early language acquisition unfolds. However, variability in how researchers quantify the N400 makes it difficult to set clear predictions or build theory. Not much is known about how the N400 component develops in the first 2 years of life in terms of its latency and topographical distributions, nor do we know how task parameters affect its appearance. In the current paper we carry out a systematic review, comparing over 30 studies that report the N400 component as a proxy of semantic processing elicited in infants between 0 and 24 months old who listened to linguistic stimuli. Our main finding is that there is large heterogeneity across semantic-priming studies in reported characteristics of the N400, both with respect to latency and to distributions. With age, the onset of the N400 insignificantly decreases, while its offset slightly increases. We also examined whether the N400 appears different for recently-acquired novel words vs. existing words: both situations reveal heterogeneity across studies. Finally, we inspected whether the N400 was modulated differently with studies using a between-subject design. In infants with more proficient language skills the N400 was more often present or showed itself here with earlier latency, compared to their peers; but no consistent patterns were observed for distribution characteristics of the N400. One limitation of the current review is that we compared studies that widely differed in choice of EEG recordings, pre-processing steps and quantification of the N400, all of which could affect the characteristics of the infant N400. The field is still missing research that systematically tests development of the N400 using the same paradigm across infancy.
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Affiliation(s)
- Caroline Junge
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands
| | - Marlijne Boumeester
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands
| | - Debra L. Mills
- School of Psychology, Bangor University, Bangor, United Kingdom
| | - Mariella Paul
- Psychology of Language Research Group, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Samuel H. Cosper
- Institute of Cognitive Science, University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany
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13
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Magyari L, Huszár Z, Turzó A, Andics A. Event-related potentials reveal limited readiness to access phonetic details during word processing in dogs. ROYAL SOCIETY OPEN SCIENCE 2020; 7:200851. [PMID: 33489257 PMCID: PMC7813267 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.200851] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/15/2020] [Accepted: 11/05/2020] [Indexed: 05/18/2023]
Abstract
While dogs have remarkable abilities for social cognition and communication, the number of words they learn to recognize typically remains very low. The reason for this limited capacity is still unclear. We hypothesized that despite their human-like auditory abilities for analysing speech sounds, their word processing capacities might be less ready to access phonetic details. To test this, we developed procedures for non-invasive measurement of event-related potentials (ERPs) for language stimuli in awake dogs (n = 17). Dogs listened to familiar instruction words and phonetically similar and dissimilar nonsense words. We compared two different artefact cleaning procedures on the same data; they led to similar results. An early (200-300 ms; only after one of the cleaning procedures) and a late (650-800 ms; after both cleaning procedures) difference was present in the ERPs for known versus phonetically dissimilar nonsense words. There were no differences between the ERPs for known versus phonetically similar nonsense words. ERPs of dogs who heard the instructions more often also showed larger differences between instructions and dissimilar nonsense words. The study revealed not only dogs' sensitivity to known words, but also their limited capacity to access phonetic details. Future work should confirm the reported ERP correlates of word processing abilities in dogs.
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Affiliation(s)
- L. Magyari
- MTA-ELTE ‘Lendület’ Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
- Department of Ethology, Institute of Biology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
- Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Psychology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1064, Hungary
- Author for correspondence: L. Magyari e-mail:
| | - Zs. Huszár
- Department of Ethology, Institute of Biology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
- Department of Cognitive Science, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest 1111, Hungary
| | - A. Turzó
- MTA-ELTE ‘Lendület’ Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
- Department of Ethology, Institute of Biology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
| | - A. Andics
- MTA-ELTE ‘Lendület’ Neuroethology of Communication Research Group, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
- Department of Ethology, Institute of Biology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest 1117, Hungary
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14
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Erratum. Dev Sci 2020; 23:e13014. [PMID: 33118703 DOI: 10.1111/desc.13014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Abstract
Infants employ sophisticated mechanisms to acquire their first language, including some that rely on taking the perspective of adults as speakers or listeners. When do infants first show awareness of what other people understand? We tested 14-month-old infants in two experiments measuring event-related potentials. In Experiment 1, we established that infants produce the N400 effect, a brain signature of semantic violations, in a live object naming paradigm in the presence of an adult observer. In Experiment 2, we induced false beliefs about the labeled objects in the adult observer to test whether infants keep track of the other person's comprehension. The results revealed that infants reacted to the semantic incongruity heard by the other as if they encountered it themselves: they exhibited an N400-like response, even though labels were congruous from their perspective. This finding demonstrates that infants track the linguistic understanding of social partners. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at https://youtu.be/pQUv8yFhnbk.
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Kampis D, Southgate V. Altercentric Cognition: How Others Influence Our Cognitive Processing. Trends Cogn Sci 2020; 24:945-959. [PMID: 32981846 DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2020.09.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/12/2020] [Revised: 09/01/2020] [Accepted: 09/02/2020] [Indexed: 12/18/2022]
Abstract
Humans are ultrasocial, yet, theories of cognition have often been occupied with the solitary mind. Over the past decade, an increasing volume of work has revealed how individual cognition is influenced by the presence of others. Not only do we rapidly identify others in our environment, but we also align our attention with their attention, which influences what we perceive, represent, and remember, even when our immediate goals do not involve coordination. Here, we refer to the human sensitivity to others and to the targets and content of their attention as 'altercentrism'; and aim to bring seemingly disparate findings together, suggesting that they are all reflections of the altercentric nature of human cognition.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dora Kampis
- Department of Psychology, University of Copenhagen, Øster Farimagsgade 2A, 1353 Copenhagen, Denmark.
| | - Victoria Southgate
- Department of Psychology, University of Copenhagen, Øster Farimagsgade 2A, 1353 Copenhagen, Denmark.
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Bergelson E. The Comprehension Boost in Early Word Learning: Older Infants Are Better Learners. CHILD DEVELOPMENT PERSPECTIVES 2020; 14:142-149. [PMID: 33569084 PMCID: PMC7872330 DOI: 10.1111/cdep.12373] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Recent research has revealed that infants begin understanding words at around 6 months. After that, infants' comprehension vocabulary increases gradually in a linear way over 8-18 months, according to data from parental checklists. In contrast, infants' word comprehension improves robustly, qualitatively, and in a nonlinear way just after their first birthday, according to data from studies on spoken word comprehension. In this review, I integrate observational and experimental data to explain these divergent results. I argue that infants' comprehension boost is not well-explained by changes in their language input for common words, but rather by proposing that they learn to take better advantage of relatively stable input data. Next, I propose potentially complementary theoretical accounts of what makes older infants better learners. Finally, I suggest how the research community can expand our empirical base in this understudied area, and why doing so will inform our knowledge about child development.
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2.5-year-olds succeed in identity and location elicited-response false-belief tasks with adequate response practice. J Exp Child Psychol 2020; 198:104890. [PMID: 32653728 DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2020.104890] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/09/2020] [Revised: 05/01/2020] [Accepted: 05/03/2020] [Indexed: 11/20/2022]
Abstract
Researchers have argued that traditional elicited-response false-belief tasks involve considerable processing demands and hence underestimate children's false-belief understanding. Consistent with this claim, Setoh et al. (2016) recently found that when processing demands were sufficiently reduced, children could succeed in an elicited-response task as early as 2.5 years of age. Here we examined whether 2.5-year-olds could also succeed in a low-demand elicited-response task involving false beliefs about identity, which have been argued to provide a critical test of whether children truly represent beliefs, while also clarifying how the practice trials in Setoh et al.'s task facilitated children's elicited-response performance. 2.5-year-olds were tested in a version of Setoh et al.'s elicited-response task in which they heard a location or identity false-belief story. We varied whether the practice trials had the same type of wh-question as the test trial. Children who heard the same type of wh-question on all trials succeeded regardless of which story they heard (location or identity) and performance did not differ across belief type. This replicates Setoh et al.'s positive results and demonstrates that when processing demands are sufficiently reduced, children can succeed in elicited-response tasks involving false beliefs about object location or identity. This suggests that children are capable of attributing genuine false beliefs prior to 4 years of age. However, children performed at chance if the practice trials involved a different type of wh-question than the test trials, suggesting that at this age practice with the wh-question used in the test trial is essential to children's success.
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Forgács B, Gervain J, Parise E, Csibra G, Gergely G, Baross J, Király I. Electrophysiological investigation of infants' understanding of understanding. Dev Cogn Neurosci 2020; 43:100783. [PMID: 32510346 PMCID: PMC7218257 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2020.100783] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/08/2019] [Revised: 04/01/2020] [Accepted: 04/09/2020] [Indexed: 11/28/2022] Open
Abstract
Social cognition might play a critical role in language acquisition and comprehension, as mindreading may be necessary to infer the intended meaning of linguistic expressions uttered by communicative partners. In three electrophysiological experiments, we explored the interplay between belief attribution and language comprehension of 14-month-old infants. First, we replicated our earlier finding: infants produced an N400 effect to correctly labelled objects when the labels did not match a communicative partner's beliefs about the referents. Second, we observed no N400 when we replaced the object with another category member. Third, when we named the objects incorrectly for infants, but congruently with the partner's false belief, we observed large N400 responses, suggesting that infants retained their own perspective in addition to that of the partner. We thus interpret the observed social N400 effect as a communicational expectancy indicator because it was contingent not on the attribution of false beliefs but on semantic expectations by both the self and the communicative partner. Additional exploratory analyses revealed an early, frontal, positive-going electrophysiological response in all three experiments, which was contingent on infants' computing the comprehension of the social partner based on attributed beliefs.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bálint Forgács
- MTA-ELTE Social Minds Research Group, Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), Izabella utca 46, 1064, Budapest, Hungary; Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Nádor utca 7, 1051, Budapest, Hungary.
| | - Judit Gervain
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, Université de Paris, 45, rue des Saints-Pères, 75006 Paris, France; Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS, 45, rue des Saints-Pères, 75006 Paris, France
| | - Eugenio Parise
- Department of Psychology, Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YF, United Kingdom; Cognitive Development Center (CDC), Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University (CEU), Nádor utca 9, 1051 Budapest, Hungary
| | - Gergely Csibra
- Cognitive Development Center (CDC), Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University (CEU), Nádor utca 9, 1051 Budapest, Hungary; Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, Malet Street, London, WC1E 7HX, United Kingdom
| | - György Gergely
- Cognitive Development Center (CDC), Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University (CEU), Nádor utca 9, 1051 Budapest, Hungary
| | - Júlia Baross
- MTA-ELTE Social Minds Research Group, Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), Izabella utca 46, 1064, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Ildikó Király
- MTA-ELTE Social Minds Research Group, Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), Izabella utca 46, 1064, Budapest, Hungary
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Forgács B, Parise E, Csibra G, Gergely G, Jacquey L, Gervain J. Fourteen-month-old infants track the language comprehension of communicative partners. Dev Sci 2018; 22:e12751. [PMID: 30184313 PMCID: PMC6492012 DOI: 10.1111/desc.12751] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/16/2018] [Revised: 08/29/2018] [Accepted: 08/31/2018] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
Infants employ sophisticated mechanisms to acquire their first language, including some that rely on taking the perspective of adults as speakers or listeners. When do infants first show awareness of what other people understand? We tested 14‐month‐old infants in two experiments measuring event‐related potentials. In Experiment 1, we established that infants produce the N400 effect, a brain signature of semantic violations, in a live object naming paradigm in the presence of an adult observer. In Experiment 2, we induced false beliefs about the labeled objects in the adult observer to test whether infants keep track of the other person's comprehension. The results revealed that infants reacted to the semantic incongruity heard by the other as if they encountered it themselves: they exhibited an N400‐like response, even though labels were congruous from their perspective. This finding demonstrates that infants track the linguistic understanding of social partners.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bálint Forgács
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (LPP), Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France.,Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (LPP), CNRS, Paris, France.,Department of Cognitive Psychology, Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), Budapest, Hungary.,Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Eugenio Parise
- Department of Psychology, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK.,Cognitive Development Center (CDC), Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University (CEU), Budapest, Hungary
| | - Gergely Csibra
- Cognitive Development Center (CDC), Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University (CEU), Budapest, Hungary.,Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
| | - György Gergely
- Cognitive Development Center (CDC), Department of Cognitive Science, Central European University (CEU), Budapest, Hungary
| | - Lisa Jacquey
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (LPP), Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France.,Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (LPP), CNRS, Paris, France
| | - Judit Gervain
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (LPP), Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France.,Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (LPP), CNRS, Paris, France
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