Abstract
Expertise with print is likely to optimize visual processes for recognizing characters of a familiar writing system. Although brain activations have been identified for words and letter strings in contrast with other stimuli, relatively little work has focused on the neural basis of single-letter perception. English readers and Chinese-English bilinguals participated in an ERP study and performed a 1-back identity judgment on Roman letters, Chinese characters, pseudofonts, and their string versions. The Chinese-English bilinguals showed an enhanced N170 for both Roman letters and Chinese characters relative to pseudofonts. For the non-Chinese readers, the N170 amplitude was larger for Roman letters relative to Chinese characters and pseudofonts. Our results suggest that changes in relatively early visual processes underlie expert letter perception.
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This research was supported by a grant from the James S. McDonnell Foundation to the Perceptual Expertise Network, NIMH Grant MH64812 to T.C., and NEI Grant EV13441-01 to I.G. We are grateful to Skip Johnson for his help with interpreting the P300 effects.
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Wong, A.C.N., Gauthier, I., Woroch, B. et al. An early electrophysiological response associated with expertise in letter perception. Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience 5, 306–318 (2005). https://doi.org/10.3758/CABN.5.3.306
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/CABN.5.3.306