Project

Discipline

cognitive neuroscience; socioeconomic status (SES); child; language learning; foreign languages; dyslexia; gender; electroencephalography (EEG); event-related potentials (ERP); immigration

Lead
Fremdsprachen sind heute ein wichtiger Teil der Fächer in den Primarschulen. Da das Gehirn bei Kindern noch sehr formbar ist, können auch viele Kinder neue Sprachen gut lernen. Manche Kinder haben dabei aber grosse Schwierigkeiten. Wie das Kindergehirn Fremdsprachen lernt ist trotz grosser Fortschritte in der modernen Hirnforschung noch weitgehend unbekannt. Solches Wissen kann aber dazu beitragen, dass Kinder mit Lernschwierigkeiten bei Fremdsprachen künftig rechtzeitig und gezielt gefördert werden.
Lay summary
In einer vom Schweizerischen Nationalfonds unterstützen Studie untersuchen wir die neuronalen Mechanismen beim Lernen von Frühenglisch in der Primarschule. Besonders interessieren uns Kinder, die möglicherweise ein Risiko aufweisen, Schwierigkeiten beim Fremdsprachenlernen zu haben. Dazu gehören vermutlich Kinder mit einer Dyslexie (Leseschwäche, Legasthenie), Kinder aus bildungsfernen Familien und möglicherweise auch Jungen ganz generell. Kinder mit Migrationshintergrund profitieren möglicherweise von ihrer Zweisprachigkeit. In einer Längsschnittstudie untersuchen wir nun die gleichen Kinder vor und nach dem ersten Jahr Englischlernen in der 2. Klasse. Dabei messen wir, wie sich das Lernen in den Hirnströmen zeigt (EEG, Elektroenzephalographie). Besonders interessiert uns, ob sich diese Veränderungen im EEG zwischen verschiedenen Risikogruppen unterscheiden, und ob man mit dem EEG vor der 2. Klasse das spätere Lernen vorhersagen kann. Wir erhoffen uns dabei ein vertieftes Verständnis der Vorgänge im Gehirn beim Fremdsprachenlernen und bei Kindern mit einem Risiko für Lernschwierigkeiten im Fremdsprachbereich. Dieses Verständnis kann dazu beitragen, dass in Zukunft gezieltere Trainingsmethoden entwickelt und Kinder mit einem Risiko frühzeitig erkannt und gefördert werden können.

Direct link to Lay Summary

Last update: 26.02.2014

Number	Title	Start	Funding scheme

Learning to speak and to read foreign languages is increasingly important in school, but the outcome varies strongly between individual children. Some children are particularly prone to becoming struggling language learners, such as children with dyslexia or possibly boys with an immigrant background. Taking an educational neuroscience approach, this project investigates how neural mechanisms are involved in children’s foreign language learning and determines the neural basis of individual differences by using EEG-based event-related brain potentials (ERPs). Using mobile EEGs in schools, three groups of children are studied in a longitudinal design before and after one year of English learning in 2nd grade: non-dyslexic monolingual children, monolingual children with reading difficulties, and non-dyslexic bilingual children. An additional control group from the Canton Bern is also included, where English teaching starts later in 5th grade. Behavioral measures of auditory (speech discrimination, vocabulary) and visual (decoding, reading comprehension) language processing will be complemented with ERP indices of phoneme specialization (mismatch negativity), specialization for print (N1 effect), and grapheme-phoneme conversion (P350-effect). The central hypothesis is that foreign language learning and associated neural processes are influenced by biological disposition and previous language experience, but differently in different risk groups. The working hypotheses propose that gender and socio-economic status affect vocabulary and comprehension measures, whereas reading difficulty affects more basic levels of language processing, as indexed behaviorally by decoding and speech discrimination, and neurally by phoneme specialization, print specialization, and grapheme-phoneme conversion. In contrast, bilingual children are not expected to show behavioral disadvantages in foreign language learning, but to show deviant processing of phoneme deviance and grapheme-phoneme conversion at the neural level. Finally, use of the neural measures recorded initially is expected to predict success of subsequent learning English in school, and to improve the prediction based on behavioral and background measures alone. An extension of the project by one year allows the main applicant and the the two PhD students to complete analyses and publish the results. Moreover, the extension also allows to follow up the same children in 4th grade using behavioral tests. This additional follow-up data is expected to reveal the extent to which individual differences in learning English are robust over time, and improve the analyses regarding group differences and regarding prediction of individual differences. The approach of the project is innovative because it bridges the traditionally disparate areas of neuroscience and education and because it applies a powerful longitudinal design along with well-validated behavioural and neural measures to a highly important social topic. The proposed research is significant because it is expected to provide the knowledge to develop tests allowing more accurate identification of children at risk for poor outcome in foreign language learning and advancement in the understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying individual differences in foreign language learning, which in turn will enable the development of training to target risk groups specifically.