Investigating individual differences in linguistic statistical learning and their relation to rhythmic and cognitive abilities: A speech segmentation experiment with online neural tracking.: In principle acceptance of Version 4 by Peer Community in Registered Reports.

Abstract

Objective: Statistical Learning (SL) is an essential mechanism for speech segmentation. Importantly, individual differences in SL ability are associated with language acquisition. For instance, better SL correlated with a larger vocabulary size and impaired SL was found in populations with language impairments. The aim of the current study is to contribute to uncovering the underpinnings of such individual differences in auditory SL for word segmentation. We hypothesize that individuals with better musical – specifically rhythmic – abilities will show better SL for speech segmentation. Methodology: Participants will be exposed to an artificial language consisting of trisyllabic nonsense words. Recent methodological innovations allow online assessment of SL via electroencephalography (EEG) measures of neural entrainment. The current study will use this EEG method to measure individual SL performance during exposure. Aiming to assess individual differences, we will link the neural measure of SL to a battery of tests assessing possible individual differences by measuring rhythmic, musical, and cognitive abilities, as well as vocabulary size. Expected results: We predict that individuals with better rhythmic abilities will show greater neural entrainment to external auditory rhythms, supporting better extraction of the transitional probabilities between syllables. Specifically, we expect to see greater neural entrainment in these individuals to the frequency of the tri-syllabic words in our stimuli, indicative of SL, than individuals with lower scores on the rhythm perception tasks. Furthermore, we exploratively investigate if larger working memory capacity contributes to better SL as captured online by the EEG measure. The question of whether vocabulary size in adulthood contributes to better SL is also explorative, as the connection between SL and vocabulary size has predominantly been researched in children. If this association persists in the adult population, it is anticipated to manifest as a positive correlation.