Auditory Associative Word Learning
In Aud-Learn we investigate the word learning abilities of 5-6-year-olds and 9-10-year-olds with environmental sounds. For additional comparisons, the language development is measured using a standardized German language assessment (SET 5-10) and modality-specific short-term episodic memory is also tested. This project is funded by the Faculty of Psychology and the Graduate Academy (Postdoc Starter Kit) of the TU Dresden.
Aims and Methods
This project is a part of a collection of work on auditory associative word learning across the lifespan. Using electroencephalography (EEG), 10-12-month-old infants have shown the ability to map novel words onto environmental sounds. In young adults, this ability is greatly diminished. Adults show an affinity for mapping novel words onto pictures, only able to map words onto environmental sounds in special conditions: when the words and sounds are presented in an overlapping manner or when the words are played before the sounds. This study investigates the phenomenon in 5-6-year-olds and 9-10-year-olds to attempt to understand how and when these abilities change over the course of childhood. In so, this project also examines the development of language (SET 5-10) and correlates the behavioral and EEG results to short-term episodic memory with environmental sounds, spoken words, and pictures of objects.
Principle Investigator
Collaborator
Selected Project-relevant Publications
Cosper, S. H., Männel, C., & Mueller, J. L. (preprint; 2023). Auditory associative word learning in adults: the effects of musical experience and stimulus ordering. bioRxiv, 2023-11. https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.11.29.569217
Cosper, S. H., Männel, C., & Mueller, J. L. (2022). Mechanisms of associative word learning: Benefits from the visual modality and synchrony of labeled objects. Cortex, 152, 36–52. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.CORTEX.2022.03.020
Cosper, S. H., Männel, C., & Mueller, J. L. (2020). In the absence of visual input: Electrophysiological evidence of infants’ mapping of labels onto auditory objects. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 45, 100821. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2020.100821