The role of rhythm in the development of speech perception and production

节奏在言语感知和产生发展中的作用

• 批准号: RGPIN-2021-03122
• 负责人: Falk, Simone
• 金额: $ 2.4万
• 依托单位: Université de Montréal
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=743916
• 关键词: role; rhythm; development; speech; perception

Unlike any other species, humans are rhythmic beings. The sounds of language and music, our two uniquely human communication systems, are rhythmically organized. They both display recurrent patterns of sound, such as syllables, notes and phrases that are predictable in time. In speech, mastering rhythm and timing is a crucial skill to interact and to keep in time together during conversation. Despite significant progress in rhythm research in the last decade, the underlying cognitive and motor mechanisms of how rhythm shapes speech perception and production are still poorly understood, especially in developmental populations. It is unclear, whether, during development, speech is produced and perceived using speech-specific or / and domain-general rhythmic mechanisms. To answer this question has important consequences for our understanding of how rhythmic capacities of different communication skills (music, speech) intertwine and may benefit speech development at different stages of development. To shed new light on these issues, the present research program will provide new insights into the role of rhythm (in particular, predictive timing) for the acquisition of critical speech capacities in infants and children/adolescents (i.e., speech sound perception, fluent speech production). The aim of a first series of experiments is to determine whether rhythmic predictions in speech and song help infants in their first year of life to process native and non-native speech in sung and spoken stimuli. Here, oscillatory dynamics will be measured (using EEG) to examine how infants neurally encode speech sounds when presented in more or less predictable rhythms of music and language. The second series of experiments tests the hypothesis that the development of fluent speech production in late childhood / adolescence is conditioned by precise, domain-general predictive timing skills. Participants will include children and adolescents (9-17 years) with and without a developmental speech fluency disorder (stuttering). The capacity to precisely predict and time a motor response to an auditory target will be compared in both groups using musical and speech synchronization tasks (such as finger tapping or speaking with a metronome). Moreover, it will be examined if improving skills in non-verbal synchronization also affects speech fluency skills. Indices of timing ability to music and speech will be used to determine whether domain-general timing processes drive the (faulty) development of speech fluency. The expected findings will provide new insights into the role of timing mechanisms in infants' and adolescents' speech acquisition. Overall, the findings will advance our knowledge on the (neuro)cognitive links underlying rhythmic processing in speech and music and provide opportunities to develop novel applications to foster speech development in children with delays or speech disorders.

与其他物种不同，人类是有节奏的生物。语言和音乐的声音，我们人类两个独特的交流系统，是有节奏的。它们都显示出重复的声音模式，如音节、音符和短语，这些都是可以预测的。在演讲中，掌握节奏和时机是在谈话中互动和保持时间的关键技能。尽管在过去的十年中，节奏的研究取得了重大进展，但节奏如何塑造语音感知和产生的潜在认知和运动机制仍然知之甚少，特别是在发育人群中。目前还不清楚，是否，在发展过程中，语音产生和感知使用语音特定或/和域一般的节奏机制。回答这个问题对于我们理解不同沟通技能（音乐、言语）的节奏能力如何相互交织具有重要意义，并且可能有利于不同发展阶段的言语发展。为了阐明这些问题，本研究计划将为婴儿和儿童/青少年获得关键言语能力（即，语音声音感知、流利的语音产生）。第一系列实验的目的是确定是否有节奏的预测语音和歌曲帮助婴儿在他们的第一年的生活中处理本地和非本地语音在歌唱和口语刺激。在这里，振荡动力学将被测量（使用脑电图），以检查婴儿如何神经编码语音时，或多或少可预测的节奏的音乐和语言。第二个系列的实验测试的假设，即在儿童期后期/青春期流利的语音生产的发展是由精确的，域一般的预测计时技能的条件。参与者将包括儿童和青少年（9-17岁），有和没有发展性语言流畅性障碍（口吃）。精确预测和时间的听觉目标运动反应的能力将在两组使用音乐和语音同步任务（如手指敲击或用节拍器说话）进行比较。此外，它将被检查，如果提高技能的非言语同步也影响语音流畅性技能。音乐和语音的时间能力指数将被用来确定是否域一般的时间过程驱动（错误）的发展语音流畅性。预期的研究结果将提供新的见解的作用，计时机制在婴儿和青少年的言语习得。总的来说，这些发现将推进我们对语音和音乐中节奏处理的（神经）认知联系的了解，并为开发新的应用程序以促进延迟或言语障碍儿童的语音发展提供机会。