TY - JOUR
T1 - Language exposure during infancy is negatively associated with white matter microstructure in the arcuate fasciculus
AU - for the IBIS Network
AU - Estrada, Katiana A.
AU - Govindaraj, Sharnya
AU - Abdi, Hervé
AU - Moraglia, Luke E.
AU - Wolff, Jason J.
AU - Meera, Shoba Sreenath
AU - Dager, Stephen R.
AU - McKinstry, Robert C.
AU - Styner, Martin A.
AU - Zwaigenbaum, Lonnie
AU - Piven, Joseph
AU - Swanson, Meghan R.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors
PY - 2023/6
Y1 - 2023/6
N2 - Decades of research have established that the home language environment, especially quality of caregiver speech, supports language acquisition during infancy. However, the neural mechanisms behind this phenomenon remain under studied. In the current study, we examined associations between the home language environment and structural coherence of white matter tracts in 52 typically developing infants from English speaking homes in a western society. Infants participated in at least one MRI brain scan when they were 3, 6, 12, and/or 24 months old. Home language recordings were collected when infants were 9 and/or 15 months old. General linear regression models indicated that infants who heard the most adult words and participated in the most conversational turns at 9 months of age also had the lowest fractional anisotropy in the left posterior parieto-temporal arcuate fasciculus at 24 months. Similarly, infants who vocalized the most at 9 months also had the lowest fractional anisotropy in the same tract at 6 months of age. This is one of the first studies to report significant associations between caregiver speech collected in the home and white matter structural coherence in the infant brain. The results are in line with prior work showing that protracted white matter development during infancy confers a cognitive advantage.
AB - Decades of research have established that the home language environment, especially quality of caregiver speech, supports language acquisition during infancy. However, the neural mechanisms behind this phenomenon remain under studied. In the current study, we examined associations between the home language environment and structural coherence of white matter tracts in 52 typically developing infants from English speaking homes in a western society. Infants participated in at least one MRI brain scan when they were 3, 6, 12, and/or 24 months old. Home language recordings were collected when infants were 9 and/or 15 months old. General linear regression models indicated that infants who heard the most adult words and participated in the most conversational turns at 9 months of age also had the lowest fractional anisotropy in the left posterior parieto-temporal arcuate fasciculus at 24 months. Similarly, infants who vocalized the most at 9 months also had the lowest fractional anisotropy in the same tract at 6 months of age. This is one of the first studies to report significant associations between caregiver speech collected in the home and white matter structural coherence in the infant brain. The results are in line with prior work showing that protracted white matter development during infancy confers a cognitive advantage.
KW - Arcuate fasciculus
KW - Diffusion tensor imaging
KW - Home language environment
KW - Infancy
KW - Language development
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85152226059&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85152226059&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.dcn.2023.101240
DO - 10.1016/j.dcn.2023.101240
M3 - Article
C2 - 37060675
AN - SCOPUS:85152226059
SN - 1878-9293
VL - 61
JO - Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience
JF - Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience
M1 - 101240
ER -