Development of Intermodal Perception of Social Events: Infancy to Childhood

描述（由申请人提供）：拟议的研究调查了社会事件的各个方面如何以及在什么条件下变得突出、被关注和被感知，以及这些方面如何在婴儿期到幼儿期的发展过程中发生变化。本研究特别探讨了婴儿在单模态听觉、单模态视觉和多模态视听刺激下对面孔、声音和语言的模态特性（速度、节奏和强度）的感知的发展过程，采用心率、眼动追踪和婴儿控制的视觉习惯等收敛测量方法。在我们的选择性注意模型（感觉间冗余假设）中产生的关于跨感官冗余在促进和组织注意力、知觉和学习多模态和单模态刺激中事件不同属性的发展中的作用的预测将被测试。五个具体目标系统地探讨了促进与减弱对面孔、声音和言语情态特性的学习的条件。通过在单一框架下研究多模态和单模态感知，我们将为整合不同的文献提供基础，并揭示刺激模态（单模态、多模态）和对事件属性的关注之间的重要相互作用（冗余与非冗余指定），这些在单独的研究设计中无法检测到。我们使用了一种新颖的收敛测量组合：视觉习惯和恢复揭示了婴儿检测到的视听言语事件的属性（面孔、声音、言语的模态属性），心率指标显示了处理的深度和效率，眼动追踪揭示了婴儿在不同条件下（冗余和非冗余）选择性地关注动态面孔的特征。通过包括不同分析水平的测量，刺激数量和类型的关键控制，任务难度的操纵，以及重复暴露的影响，我们将揭示更多关于社会事件注意显著性的性质，基础和过程，而不是单独的研究或单一的测量所能揭示的。选择性注意和学习社会事件的模式与我们之前对非社会事件的研究趋同，这表明一般的知觉过程控制着这一领域的注意和学习。我们的目标是推进注意力和知觉领域的发展理论，并建立婴儿对社会事件关键方面的感官间和单模信息的敏感性规范，这些信息可用于评估非典型发展模式，并可作为干预的基础。评估多模态条件还将提高生态有效性，并促进将研究结果转化为现实世界的学习环境。公共卫生相关性：本研究将揭示关于婴幼儿在单模态视觉、单模态听觉和多模态视听刺激下对面孔、声音和语言的情态方面（速度、节奏、强度）的注意和感知的性质、基础和发展的新信息。关于在不同条件下对社会事件的不同属性的选择性注意的本质的视觉习惯化、心率和眼动追踪的收敛测量将提供通常单独研究的过程的全面和综合的图像。研究结果将提供大量关于典型发育模式的重要信息，这些信息对于识别非典型发育模式是新颖和必要的，包括自闭症的社会注意缺陷特征。研究结果很容易转化为现实世界的环境，可以作为干预发育迟缓的基础。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed research investigates how and under what conditions various aspects of social events become salient, attended, and perceived and how this changes across development from infancy through early childhood. In particular, this proposal explores the developmental course of infants' perception of faces, voices, and amodal properties of speech (tempo, rhythm, and intensity) in unimodal auditory, unimodal visual, and multimodal, audiovisual stimulation using convergent measures of heart rate, eye tracking, and infant controlled visual habituation. Predictions concerning the role of redundancy across the senses in promoting and organizing the development of attention, perception, and learning about different properties of events in multimodal and unimodal stimulation, generated from of our model of selective attention (the intersensory redundancy hypothesis) will be tested. Five specific aims systematically explore the conditions that facilitate versus attenuate learning about faces, voices, and amodal properties of speech. By investigating multimodal and unimodal perception under a single framework, we will provide a basis for integrating separate literatures and reveal important interactions between modality of stimulation (unimodal, multimodal) and attention to properties of events (redundantly versus nonredundantly specified) that cannot be detected in separate research designs. We use a novel combination of convergent measures: visual habituation and recovery reveal what properties of audiovisual speech events infants detect (faces, voices, amodal properties of speech), heart rate indexes the depth and efficiency of processing, and eye tracking reveals what features of dynamic faces infants selectively attend under different conditions (redundant vs nonredundant). By including measures across different levels of analysis, critical controls for amount and type of stimulation, manipulations of task difficulty, and effects of repeated exposure, we will reveal much more about the nature, basis, and processes underlying the attentional salience of social events than can be revealed by separate studies or single measures. Patterns of selective attention and learning about social events that converge with those of our prior studies of nonsocial events will suggest that general perceptual processes govern attention and learning in this domain. Our goals are to advance developmental theory in the area of attention and perception, and to establish norms for infant sensitivity to intersensory and unimodal information about critical aspects of social events that can be used for assessing atypical patterns of development and can serve as a basis for interventions. Assessing multimodal conditions will also enhance ecological validity and foster translation of findings to real world learning contexts. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: This research will reveal new information about the nature, basis, and development of attention to and perception of faces, voices, and amodal aspects of speech (tempo, rhythm, intensity) in unimodal visual, unimodal auditory, and multimodal audiovisual stimulation in infants and young children. Convergent measures of visual habituation, heart rate, and eye tracking, about the nature of selective attention to different properties of social events under different conditions, will provide a comprehensive and integrated picture of processes usually studied separately. Findings will provide a wealth of critical information about typical developmental patterns at a level of detail that is novel and necessary for identifying atypical patterns of development, including social attention deficits characteristic of autism. Findings are easily translated to real world settings and can serve as a basis for interventions for developmental delays.