Cortical tracking of speech in noise accounts for reading strategies in children

Abstract

Published: August 26, 2020Humans’ propensity to acquire literacy relates to several factors, including the ability to understand speech in noise (SiN). Still, the nature of the relation between reading and SiN perception abilities remains poorly understood. Here, we dissect the interplay between (1) reading abilities, (2) classical behavioral predictors of reading (phonological awareness, phonological memory, and rapid automatized naming), and (3) electrophysiological markers of SiN perception in 99 elementary school children (26 with dyslexia). We demonstrate that, in typical readers, cortical representation of the phrasal content of SiN relates to the degree of development of the lexical (but not sublexical) reading strategy. In contrast, classical behavioral predictors of reading abilities and the ability to benefit from visual speech to represent the syllabic content of SiN account for global reading performance (i.e., speed and accuracy of lexical and sublexical reading). In individuals with dyslexia, we found preserved integration of visual speech information to optimize processing of syntactic information but not to sustain acoustic/phonemic processing. Finally, within children with dyslexia, measures of cortical representation of the phrasal content of SiN were negatively related to reading speed and positively related to the compromise between reading precision and reading speed, potentially owing to compensatory attentional mechanisms. These results clarify the nature of the relation between SiN perception and reading abilities in typical child readers and children with dyslexia and identify novel electrophysiological markers of emergent literacy.F.D., J.B. and M.B. were supported by the program Attract of Innoviris (https://innoviris. brussels/; grant number 2015-BB2B-10). J.B. was supported by a research grant from the Fonds de Soutien Marguerite-Marie Delacroix (https://www. fondsmmdelacroix.org/). R.A.A.I. was supported by the Wellcome Trust (https://wellcome.ac.uk/; grant number 214120/Z/18/Z). X.D.T. was Postdoctorate Clinical Master Specialist at the Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique (F.R.S.-FNRS, https:// www.frs-fnrs.be/en/). M.B. was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (https://www.ciencia.gob.es/; grant number PSI2016-77175-P), and by the Marie Skłodowska- Curie Action of the European Commission (https:// ec.europa.eu/research/mariecurieactions/mscaactions_ en; grant number 743562). This study and the MEG project at the CUB Hoˆpital Erasme are financially supported by the Fonds Erasme (https:// www.fondserasme.org/fondserasme_en.html; Research Convention “Les Voies du Savoir”). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript