The modulators of infant learning

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Learning is the scaffold of cognitive development. Different learning types, including repetitive learning, have been revealed to be present very early on and to be the base of higher cognition. Despite years of research on infant perceptual learning, we do not know the modulators and enhancers of infant perceptual learning capacities and through which mechanisms they operate. ******Sensory data derived from the environment are captured by the brain as regularities. We know infants are experts in processing these regularities as they learn language, for example. However, it is not clear whether this capacity is the result of sensorial, bottom-up processing, or a combined effort from bottom-up and top-down processes. ******Over the past years, my laboratory has contributed to our understanding of perceptual learning mechanisms by revealing the signature of repetition effect brain activity (high-density EEG). Our results suggest that repetition suppression is not the result of fatigue, but the reflection of a complexity increase in the brain signal which accompanies the formation of a memory trace. Importantly, we have demonstrated the contributive role of the frontal lobe in the adult repetition effect brain responses, a modulating pathway that remains to be investigated in infants. ******In this new research endeavor, we will assess how infant learning can be modulated to potentiate or hinder knowledge acquisition required for higher cognition development. Stress, sleep, and cueing are well-known modulators of learning and memory capacities in adults. In this research program, we will assess how they modulate infant brain learning responses throughout the first year of life. In a series of experiments, we will measure expectancies, surprise and learning signals throughout the first year of life using high-density EEG. Specifically, we will assess whether bottom-up and top-down processing pathways develop, how learning brain responses are potentiated/affected by stress, and if they occur during sleep. ******Through a greater understanding of infant learning mechanisms, we will eventually be able to propose learning enhancing methods specific to infancy, a crucial developmental time period.