Although statistical learning (SL) has been studied extensively in developmental dyslexia (DD), less attention has been paid to other fundamental challenges in language acquisition, such as cross-situational word learning. Such investigation is important for determining whether and how SL processes are affected in DD at the word level. In this…

Some theories have proposed that autistic individuals have difficulty learning predictive relationships. We tested this hypothesis using a serial reaction time task in which participants learned to predict the locations of a repeating sequence of target locations. We conducted a large-sample online study with 61 autistic and 71 neurotypical…

Visual search is faster when a fixed target location is paired with a spatially invariant (vs. randomly changing) distractor configuration, thus indicating that repeated contexts are learned, thereby guiding attention to the target (contextual cueing [CC]). Evidence for memory-guided attention has also been revealed with electrophysiological…

This study tested whether individual sensitivity to an auditory perceptual cue called amplitude rise time (ART) facilitates novel word learning. Forty adult native speakers of Polish performed a perceptual task testing their sensitivity to ART, learned associations between nonwords and pictures of common objects, and were subsequently tested on…

Distributional learning is typically understood as (unattended) tracking of stimulus probabilities. Distributional training with speech yields mixed results and the influencing factors have not yet been fully investigated. This study explored whether prior linguistic experience could have an effect on distributional learning outcomes. Czech and…

Purpose: The extant literature suggests that individual differences in speech perception can be linked to broad receptive language phenotype. For example, a recent study found that individuals with a smaller receptive vocabulary showed diminished lexically guided perceptual learning compared to individuals with a larger receptive vocabulary. Here,…

Comprehension of many types of texts involves constructing meaning from text and pictures. However, research examining how second language (L2) learners process text and pictures and the relationship with comprehension is scarce. Thus, while verbal input is often presented in written and auditory modes simultaneously (i.e., audio of text with…

The learning-style theory of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) (Qian, Lipkin, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 5:77, 2011) states that ASD individuals differ from neurotypics in the way they learn and store information about the environment and its structure. ASD would rather adopt a "lookup-table" strategy (LUT: memorizing each…

Perceptual grouping is fundamental to many auditory processes. The Iambic-Trochaic Law (ITL) is a default grouping strategy, where rhythmic alternations of duration are perceived iambically (weak-strong), while alternations of intensity are perceived trochaically (strong-weak). Some argue that the ITL is experience dependent. For instance, French…

Although it is currently accepted that the extinction effect reflects new context-dependent learning, this is not so clear during infancy, because some studies did not find recovery of the extinguished conditioned response (CR) in rodents during this ontogenetic stage. However, recent studies have shown the return of an extinguished CR in infant…

This study investigates how second language (L2) listeners' perception is affected by two factors: the listeners' experience with the target dialect -- North American English (NAE) vs. Standard Southern British English (SSBE) -- and talkers' language background: native vs. non-native talkers; i.e. interlanguage speech intelligibility benefit…

Providing evidence for the universal tendencies of patterns in the world's languages can be difficult, as it is impossible to sample all possible languages, and linguistic samples are subject to interpretation. However, experimental techniques, such as artificial grammar learning paradigms, make it possible to uncover the psychological reality of…

Adults tend to perceive speech sounds from their native language as members of distinct and stable categories; however, they fail to perceive differences between many non-native speech sounds without a great deal of training. The present study investigates the effects of categorization training on adults' ability to discriminate non-native…

Learning a second language as an adult is particularly effortful when new phonetic representations must be formed. Therefore the processes that allow learning of speech sounds are of great theoretical and practical interest. Here we examined whether perception of single formant transitions, that is, sound components critical in speech perception,…

Song learning, maintenance and production require coordinated activity across multiple auditory, sensory-motor, and neuromuscular structures. Telencephalic components of the sensory-motor circuitry are unique to avian species that engage in song learning. The song system shows protracted development that begins prior to hatching but continues well…