Poster D74, Wednesday, August 21, 2019, 5:15 – 7:00 pm, Restaurant Hall
Phonological Processing During Implicit Task in Chinese Deaf Readers: An ERP Investigation
Jian'e Bai1,2,3, Jing Wang1,2,3, Yiming Yang1,2,3,4;1School of Linguistic Sciences and Arts, Jiangsu Normal University, 2Jiangsu Collaborative Innovation Center for Language Ability, 3Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Language and Cognitive Neuroscience, 4Institute of Linguistic Science, Jiangsu Normal University
Previous studies showed that deaf people had difficulties in reading alphabetic writing scripts and many researchers attributed deaf readers’ reading difficulties to their difficulties in phonological processing which plays an important role in alphabetic reading. However, whether Chinese deaf readers can process phonological information of logographic Chinese characters is still unknown. In this study, we recruited Chinese deaf readers and their hearing controls to investigate this question by comparing the results of the two groups. Fourteen deaf readers with high school or higher educational level and fourteen hearing readers matched them with non-verbal intelligence, educational level and Chinese literacy took part in our study. We conducted a priming experiment. According to the phonological relation between prime and target, two conditions were included. On the experimental condition, prime and target were homophones; on the control condition, prime and target were characters with different phonology. Subjects were asked to do a lexical decision task and to response with keyboard. We recorded the behavioral and event-related potentials (ERP) data of the two groups. Behavioral data showed that significant phonological priming effect occurred for both groups. The response time to targets on homophonic condition was significantly shorter than on control condition for hearing people and also deaf people. ERP data showed that N250 and N400 components were induced both in deaf and hearing readers. We compared the ERP waveforms elicited by targets on homophonic condition with on control condition for both group respectively. In the time window of 200-250ms, no significant N250 effect was observed for deaf readers, while significant effects were observed at the electrodes in the midline of the left and right hemispheres for hearing readers. In the time window of 250-300ms, significant N250 effects were observed at the central parietal region and parietal region of the right hemisphere for deaf readers and marginal significant N250 effects were observed at the electrodes in the parietal region of the right hemisphere for hearing readers. In the time window of 300-400ms, no N400 effect was found for both groups. The results showed that deaf readers could process phonological information automatically during implicit task, which mainly reflected in the N250 effect in ERP waveforms. According to the behavioral and ERP results, we concluded that deaf Chinese readers with high school or higher education level could process phonological information in Chinese characters automatically. Compared with hearing readers, phonological processing in deaf readers started later and reflected in ERP waves elicited in the parietal middle area and the parietal area of the right hemisphere. These results implied that the mechanism of phonological processing in deaf Chinese readers and in hearing Chinese readers may be different. The work was supported by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (31400866), Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (14KJB180006), Jiangsu Provincial Foundation for Philosophy and Social Sciences (12YYC015), Foundation for Doctors in Jiangsu Normal University (12XLR009), Jiangsu Province Postdoctoral Foundation. Corresponding Authors:Jiane Bai (baije9972@gmail.com) and Yiming Yang (yangym@jsnu.edu.cn). First co-authors: Jiane Bai and Jing Wang.
Themes: Reading, Phonology and Phonological Working Memory
Method: Electrophysiology (MEG/EEG/ECOG)