Shared Reading Quality and Brain Activation during Story Listening in Preschool-Age Children.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the relationship between maternal shared reading quality (verbal interactivity and engagement) and brain function during story listening in at-risk, preschool-age children, in the context of behavioral evidence and American Academy of Pediatrics, recommendations. STUDY DESIGN: In this cross-sectional study, 22 healthy, 4-year-old girls from low socioeconomic status households completed functional magnetic resonance imaging using an established story listening task, followed by videotaped observation of uncoached mother-daughter reading of the same, age-appropriate picture book. Shared reading quality was independently scored applying dialogic reading and other evidence-based criteria reflecting interactivity and engagement, and applied as a predictor of neural activation during the functional magnetic resonance imaging task, controlling for income and maternal education. RESULTS: Shared reading quality scores were generally low and negatively correlated with maternal distraction by smartphones (P < .05). Scores were positively correlated with activation in left-sided brain areas supporting expressive and complex language, social-emotional integration, and working memory (P <.05, false discovery rate corrected). CONCLUSIONS: Maternal shared reading quality is positively correlated with brain activation supporting complex language, executive function, and social-emotional processing in at-risk, preschool-age children. These findings represent novel neural biomarkers of how this modifiable aspect of home reading environment may influence foundational emergent literacy skills, reinforce behavioral evidence and American Academy of Pediatrics, recommendations, and underscore the potential of dialogic reading interventions to promote healthy brain development, especially in at-risk households.

A functional magnetic resonance imaging study of language function in international adoptees.

OBJECTIVE: To test the hypothesis that international adoption of Chinese and Eastern European girls after 9 months of age results in long-term changes in the neural circuitry supporting monolingual English in later childhood. STUDY DESIGN: Functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to test this hypothesis by comparison with a control group of American-born English speakers (n = 13). Girls now aged 6-10 years adopted from China (n = 13) and Eastern Europe (n = 12) by English-speaking families were recruited through a pediatric hospital-based international adoption center after spending more than 6 months in an orphanage or other institution, a measure of early environmental deprivation. Functional magnetic resonance imaging scans were performed on a 3 Tesla MRI scanner using a verb generation language fluency task. Composite activation maps were computed for each group using a general linear model with random effects analysis. RESULTS: Chinese born adoptees demonstrate atypical lateralization of language function with an apparent shift of temporal-parietal and frontal areas of brain activity toward the right hemisphere. Eastern European adoptees exhibited a rightward shift relative to controls in both frontal and temporal-parietal brain regions. CONCLUSIONS: Significant differences in lateralization between the Chinese and American-born groups in temporal-parietal language areas highlight the possible impact of early tonal Asian language exposure on neural circuitry. Findings suggest that exposure to an Asian language during infancy can leave a long-term imprint on the neural circuitry supporting English language development.