By 4.5 Months, Linguistic Experience Already Affects Infants’ Talker Processing Abilities

Abstract

Contemporary models of adult speech perception acknowledge that the processing of linguistic and nonlinguistic aspects of the speech signal are interdependent. But when in development does this interdependence first emerge? In the adult literature, one way to demonstrate this relationship has been to examine how language experience affects talker identification. Thus, in this study, 4- to 5-month-old infants (N=96) were tested on their ability to tell apart talkers in a familiar language (English) compared to unfamiliar languages (Polish or Spanish). Infants readily distinguished between talkers in the familiar language but not in the unfamiliar languages, supporting the hypothesis that the integrated processing of linguistic and nonlinguistic information in speech is early emerging and robust.