title: An Association between Auditory-Visual Synchrony Processing and Reading Comprehension: Behavioral and Electrophysiological Evidence.
abstract: The perceptual system integrates synchronized auditory-visual signals in part to promote individuation of objects in cluttered environments. The processing of auditory-visual synchrony may more generally contribute to cognition by synchronizing internally generated multimodal signals. Reading is a prime example because the ability to synchronize internal phonological and/or lexical processing with visual orthographic processing may facilitate encoding of words and meanings. Consistent with this possibility, developmental and clinical research has suggested a link between reading performance and the ability to compare visual spatial/temporal patterns with auditory temporal patterns. Here, we provide converging behavioral and electrophysiological evidence suggesting that greater behavioral ability to judge auditory-visual synchrony (Experiment 1) and greater sensitivity of an electrophysiological marker of auditory-visual synchrony processing (Experiment 2) both predict superior reading comprehension performance, accounting for 16% and 25% of the variance, respectively. These results support the idea that the mechanisms that detect auditory-visual synchrony contribute to reading comprehension.
authors.affiliation: Northwestern University.
authors.forename: Julia
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mossbridge
authors.affiliation: Northwestern University.
authors.forename: Jacob
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zweig
authors.affiliation: Northwestern University.
authors.forename: Marcia
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Grabowecky
authors.affiliation: Northwestern University.
authors.forename: Satoru
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Suzuki
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D032882:Comprehension / Q000502:physiology*; D004569:Electroencephalography; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment / Q000502:physiology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D011601:Psychophysics; D011932:Reading; D013997:Time Factors; D013998:Time Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult