News | April 27, 2015

Study provides new evidence that book sharing in early childhood may promote brain development supporting reading readiness

children, reading, fMRI, brain activity, Pediatric Academic Societies, PAS

April 27, 2015 — New evidence suggests reading to young children is in fact associated with differences in brain activity supporting early reading skills. The research was presented Saturday, April 25 at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in San Diego.

Among the advice new parents receive is to read to their babies early and often. The hope is that sharing books together will help children's language development and eventually, turn them into successful readers.

"We are excited to show, for the first time, that reading exposure during the critical stage of development prior to kindergarten seems to have a meaningful, measurable impact on how a child's brain processes stories and may help predict reading success," said study author John Hutton, M.D., National Research Service Award Fellow, Division of General and Community Pediatrics, Reading and Literacy Discovery Center, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. "Of particular importance are brain areas supporting mental imagery, helping the child 'see the story' beyond the pictures, affirming the invaluable role of imagination."

Professional organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and advocacy groups have encouraged parents to read to their children from birth to foster early learning and create connections in the brain that promote language development. Direct evidence of effects on the brain, however, was not previously available.

To show whether reading to preschoolers affects brain networks that support reading skills, Hutton and his colleagues studied 19 healthy preschoolers ages 3-5 years old, 37 percent of whom were from low-income households. Each child's primary caregiver completed a questionnaire designed to measure cognitive stimulation in the home. The questionnaire looked at three areas: parent-child reading, including access to books, frequency of reading and variety of books read; parent-child interaction, including talking and playing; and whether parents taught specific skills such as counting and shapes.

The children then underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which measured brain activity while they were listening to age-appropriate stories via headphones. The children were awake and non-sedated during fMRI, and there was no visual stimulus. Researchers were interested in whether there would be differences in brain activation supporting comprehension of the stories in areas known to be involved with language.

Results showed that greater home reading exposure was strongly associated with activation of specific brain areas supporting semantic processing (the extraction of meaning from language). These areas are critical for oral language and later for reading.

Brain areas supporting mental imagery showed particularly strong activation, suggesting that visualization plays a key role in narrative comprehension and reading readiness, allowing children to "see" the story. "This becomes increasingly important as children advance from books with pictures to books without them, where they must imagine what is going on in the text," Hutton said.

The associations between home reading exposure and brain activity remained robust after controlling for household income.

"We hope that this work will guide further research on shared reading and the developing brain to help improve interventions and identify children at risk for difficulties as early as possible, increasing the chances that they will be successful in the wonderful world of books," Hutton concluded.

For more information: www.pas-meeting.org


Related Content

News | Radiology Business

July 25, 2024 — Immunis, Inc., a clinical-stage biotech developing groundbreaking secretome therapeutics for age and ...

Time July 25, 2024
arrow
News | RSNA

July 23, 2024 — Professional registration is open for RSNA 2024, the world’s largest radiology forum. This year’s theme ...

Time July 23, 2024
arrow
News | Artificial Intelligence

July 23, 2024 — Researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) found that an artificial intelligence (AI) model ...

Time July 23, 2024
arrow
News | Artificial Intelligence

July 17, 2024 — Hyperfine, a groundbreaking medical device company that has redefined brain imaging with the world’s ...

Time July 17, 2024
arrow
News | Prostate Cancer

July 11, 2024 — GE HealthCare’s MIM Software, a global provider of medical imaging analysis and artificial intelligence ...

Time July 11, 2024
arrow
News | Prostate Cancer

July 2, 2024 — A new editorial paper was published in Oncoscience (Volume 11) on May 20, 2024, entitled, “Deep learning ...

Time July 02, 2024
arrow
News | Clinical Trials

June 27, 2024 — Prenuvo, which makes whole-body MRI screening for early cancer detection and other diseases, has ...

Time June 27, 2024
arrow
News | Pediatric Imaging

June 25, 2024 — Rady Children’s Hospital-San Diego, one of the nation’s top pediatric health care systems, today ...

Time June 25, 2024
arrow
News | MRI Breast

June 12, 2024 — Royal Philips recently announced the 1,111th installation of its revolutionary BlueSeal 1.5T magnet ...

Time June 12, 2024
arrow
News | Radiology Business

May 29, 2024 — Strategic Radiology added a third California member to the nation’s leading coalition of independent ...

Time May 29, 2024
arrow
Subscribe Now