TY - JOUR
T1 - Rapid maturation of voice and linguistic processing systems in preschool children
T2 - A near-infrared spectroscopic study
AU - Yamasaki, Takao
AU - Ogata, Katsuya
AU - Maekawa, Toshihiko
AU - Ijichi, Ikue
AU - Katagiri, Masatoshi
AU - Mitsudo, Takako
AU - Kamio, Yoko
AU - Tobimatsu, Shozo
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported in part by a grant from JST , RISTEX , and Grants-in-Aid for Scientists, No. 23601010 , from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in Japan . We sincerely thank all participants and their mothers for their enthusiastic contributions to the research project. We would like to thank Ms. Yuko Tanaka and Ms. Kumi Fujino for their research assistance.
PY - 2013/12
Y1 - 2013/12
N2 - To better understand how voice and linguistic processing systems develop during the preschool years, changes in cerebral oxygenation were measured bilaterally from temporal areas using multi-channel near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). NIRS was recorded while children listened to their mothers' voice (MV), an unfamiliar female voice (UV) and environmental sound (ES) stimuli. Twenty typical children (aged 3-6. years) were divided into younger (Y) (. n=. 10, male. =. 5; aged 3-4.5. years) and older (O) (. n=. 10, male. =. 5; aged 4.5-6. years) groups. In the Y group, while MV stimuli significantly activated anterior temporal areas with a right predominance compared to ES stimuli, they significantly activated left mid-temporal areas compared to UV stimuli. These temporal activations were significantly higher in the Y group compared to the O group. Furthermore, only the O group exhibited significant habituation and gender differences in the left mid-temporal area during MV perception. These findings suggest that the right voice-related and the left language-related temporal areas already exist in the Y group, and that MV stimuli modulate these areas differently in the two age groups. Therefore, we conclude that a mother's voice plays an important role in the maturation of the voice and linguistic processing systems, particularly during the first half of the preschool-aged period. This role may decrease during the latter half of the preschool-aged period due to rapid development of these systems as children age.
AB - To better understand how voice and linguistic processing systems develop during the preschool years, changes in cerebral oxygenation were measured bilaterally from temporal areas using multi-channel near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). NIRS was recorded while children listened to their mothers' voice (MV), an unfamiliar female voice (UV) and environmental sound (ES) stimuli. Twenty typical children (aged 3-6. years) were divided into younger (Y) (. n=. 10, male. =. 5; aged 3-4.5. years) and older (O) (. n=. 10, male. =. 5; aged 4.5-6. years) groups. In the Y group, while MV stimuli significantly activated anterior temporal areas with a right predominance compared to ES stimuli, they significantly activated left mid-temporal areas compared to UV stimuli. These temporal activations were significantly higher in the Y group compared to the O group. Furthermore, only the O group exhibited significant habituation and gender differences in the left mid-temporal area during MV perception. These findings suggest that the right voice-related and the left language-related temporal areas already exist in the Y group, and that MV stimuli modulate these areas differently in the two age groups. Therefore, we conclude that a mother's voice plays an important role in the maturation of the voice and linguistic processing systems, particularly during the first half of the preschool-aged period. This role may decrease during the latter half of the preschool-aged period due to rapid development of these systems as children age.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84886822378&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84886822378&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.expneurol.2013.10.005
DO - 10.1016/j.expneurol.2013.10.005
M3 - Article
C2 - 24120467
AN - SCOPUS:84886822378
SN - 0014-4886
VL - 250
SP - 313
EP - 320
JO - Experimental Neurology
JF - Experimental Neurology
ER -