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bioRxiv · 10.1101/2022.09.09.507239

Your turn, my turn. Neural synchrony in mother-infant proto-conversation.

Nguyen, T.·Zimmer, L.·Hoehl, S.
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Abstract

Even before infants utter their first words, they engage in highly coordinated vocal exchanges with their caregivers. During these so-called proto-conversations, caregiver-infant dyads use a presumably universal communication structure - turn-taking, which has been linked to favourable developmental outcomes. However, little is known about potential mechanisms involved in early turn-taking. Previous research pointed to interpersonal synchronisation of brain activity between adults and preschool-aged children during turn-taking. Here, we assessed caregivers and infants at 4-6 months of age (N=55) during a face-to-face interaction. We used functional-near infrared spectroscopy hyperscanning to measure dyads brain activity and microcoded their turn-taking. We also measured infants inter-hemispheric connectivity as an index for brain maturity and later vocabulary size and attachment security as developmental outcomes potentially linked to turn-taking. The results showed that more frequent turn-taking was related to interpersonal neural synchrony, but the strength of the relation decreased over the course of the proto-conversation. Importantly, turn-taking was positively associated with infant brain maturity and later vocabulary size, but not with later attachment security. Taken together, these findings shed light on mechanisms facilitating preverbal turn-taking and stress the importance of emerging turn-taking for child brain and language development.

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Nguyen, T., Zimmer, L., Hoehl, S.. 2022-09-10. Your turn, my turn. Neural synchrony in mother-infant proto-conversation.. https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.09.09.507239

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