I-LABS: Patricia Kuhl, Ph.D.

Current Research

Patricia K. Kuhl, Ph.D.

Endowed Chair, Bezos Family Foundation for Earily Childhood Learning
Co-Director, UW Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences
Director, NSF Science of Learning Center (LIFE)
Professor, Department of Speech & Hearing Sciences

Research Interests

NATIVE LANGUAGE MAGNET/NEURAL COMMITMENT THEORY
MATERNAL LANGUAGE INPUT
AUDITORY-VISUAL SPEECH PERCEPTION
LANGUAGE AND BRAIN PLASTICITY (Infant ERP)
AUTISM
COMPUTER LEARNING AND SPEECH
REINTERPRETING THE 'CRITICAL PERIOD' PHENOMENON
PREDICTING LANAGUAGE FROM EARLY SPEECH PERCEPTION
ADULTS, INFANTS AND TEENS USING fMRI AND MEG
INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATORS

Native Language Magnet theory expanded (NLM-e)

How do infants acquire sounds in their native language?

Infants are born "citizens of the world" with regard to language. They can distinguish sounds from languages around the world, even if they've never heard them before. By the end of the first year of life, however, they become "language-specialists," and the ability to attend to sounds from foreign languages greatly diminishes, as their native-language abilities significantly increase. Dr. Kuhl has proposed the Native Language Magnet Theory Expanded (NLM-e) to account for this dramatic developmental change. The model shows that infants use their computational abilities to "crack" the speech code and, interestingly, that infants' social skills play an important role in learning.

Selected Publications:

Kuhl, P. K., Conboy, B. T., Coffey-Corina, S., Padden, D., Rivera-Gaxiola, M., & Nelson, T. (2008). Native Language Magnet Theory Expanded (NLM-e). Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 363, 979-1000. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K. (2008). Linking infant speech perception to language acquisition: Phonetic learning predicts language growth. In P. McCardle, J. Colombo & L. Freund (Eds.), Infant Pathways to Language: Methods, Models, and Research Directions (pp. 213-243). Erlbaum: New York.

Kuhl, P. K. (2007). Is speech learning 'gated' by the social brain? Developmental Science, 10, 110-120. Click here to receive a reprint

Tsao, F.-M., Liu, H.-M., & Kuhl, P. K. (2006). Perception of native and non-native affricate-fricative contrasts: Cross language tests on adults and infants. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 120, 2285-2294. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K., Stevens, E., Hayashi, A., Deguchi, T., Kiritani, S., & Iverson, P. (2006). Infants show facilitation for native language phonetic perception between 6 and 12 months. Developmental Science, 9, 13-21. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K., Conboy, B. T., Padden, D., Nelson, T. and Pruitt, J. (2005). Early speech perception and later language development: Implications for the "critical period." Language Learning and Development, 1, 237-264. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K. (2004). Early language acquisition: Cracking the speech code. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 5, 831-843. Click here to receive a reprint

Iverson, P., Kuhl, P. K., Akahane-Yamada, R., Diesch, E., Tohkura, Y., Kettermann, A. & Siebert, C. (2003). A perceptual interference account of acquisition difficulties for non-native phonemes. Cognition 87, B47-57. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K., Tsao, F. M., Liu, H. M., Zhang, Y. & de Boer, B. (2001). Language/Culture/Mind/Brain: Progress at the Margins Between Disciplines. In A. Domasio et al. (Eds.). Unity of knowledge: The convergence of natural and human science (pp. 136-174). New York: The New York Academy of Sciences.

Kuhl, P.K. (2000). A new view of language acquisition. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. 97(22), 11850-11857. Click here to receive a reprint

Iverson, P & Kuhl, P.K. (2000). Perceptual magnet and phoneme boundary effects in speech perception: Do they arise from a common mechanism? Perception and Psychophysics. 62(4), 874-886.

Kuhl, P. K. (2000). Language, mind, and brain: Experience alters perception. In M. S. Gazzaniga (Ed.), The new cognitive neurosciences (2nd ed.) (pp. 99-115). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Doupe, A., & Kuhl, P. K. (1999). Birdsong and speech: Common themes and mechanisms. Annual review of Neuroscience, 22, 567-631.

Kuhl, P. K. (1998). The development of speech and language. In T. J. Carew, R. Menzel, & C. J. Shatz (Eds.), Mechanistic relationships between development and learning (pp. 53-73). New York: Wiley.

Iverson, P. & Kuhl, P. K. (1996). Influences of phonetic identification and category goodness on American listeners' perception of /r/ and /l/. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 99, 1130-1140.

Kuhl, P. K. (1994). Learning and representation in speech and language. Current Opinion in Neurobiology, 4, 812-822.

Kuhl, P. K. (1993). Early Linguistic experience and phonetic perception: Implications for theories of developmental speech perception. Journal of Phonetics, 21, 125-139.

Kuhl, P. K. (1993). Innate predispositions and the effects of experience in speech perception: The native language magnet theory. In B. deBoysson-Bardies, S. de Schonen, P. Jusczyk, P. McNeilage & J. Morton (Eds.), Developmental neurocognition: Speech and face processing in the first year of life (pp. 259-274). Dordrecht, Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

Kuhl, P. K., Williams, K. A., Lacerda, F., Stevens, K. N. & Lindblom, B. (1992). Linguistic experience alters phonetic perception in infants by 6 months of age. Science, 255, 606-608.

Kuhl, P. K. (1991). Human adults and human infants show a "perceptual magnet effect" for the prototypes of speech categories, monkeys do not. Perception & Psychophysics, 50, 93-107.

Grieser, D. & Kuhl, P. K. (1989). Categorization of speech by infants: Support for speech-sound prototypes. Developmental Psychology, 25, 577-588.

Maternal Language Input

"Parentese" speech is a special way that adults communicate with infants. The way that caregivers talk to infants is special. Characteristics of this "parentese" speech include higher pitch, longer duration, and more exaggerated pitch changes than speech that is directed to other adults. This type of speech is observed in parents and caretakers who speak Russian, Zulu, Mandarin and all other languages studied. It appears to be universal. Dr. Kuhl's research shows that parents also make other subtle changes in their speech to infants, changes that make speech clearer and more distinct for children. Mothers "stretch" the vowel triangle, making speech sounds more distinct, when speaking to infants and the degree to which mothers do so predicts their infant's speech perception abilities when tested in the laboratory. Kuhl's research also shows that infants as young as 20 weeks mimic the vowel sounds they hear, indicating that parentese may play a tutorial role in helping infants learn about speech.

Selected Publications:

Liu, H.-M., Tsao, F.-M, & Kuhl, P. K. (2007). Acoustic analysis of lexical tone in Mandarin infant-directed speech. Developmental Psychology, 43, 912-917. Click here to receive a reprint

Liu, H.-M, Kuhl, P.K. & Tsao, F.-M. (2003) An association between mother's speech clarity and infants' speech discrimination skills. Developmental Science, 6, F1-F10. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K., Andruski, J. E., Chistovich, I. A., Chistovich, L. A., Kozhevnikova, E. V., Ryskina, V. L., Stolyarova, E. I., Sundberg, U., & Lacerda, F. (1997). Cross-language analysis of phonetic units in language addressed to infants, Science, 277, 684-686. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K. & Meltzoff, A. N. (1996). Infant vocalizations in response to speech: Vocal imitation and developmental change. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 100, 2425-2438.

Grieser, D. L. & Kuhl, P. K. (1988). Maternal speech to infants in a tonal language: Support for universal prosodic features in motherese. Developmental Psychology, 24, 14-20.

Fernald, A. & Kuhl, P. (1987). Acoustic determinants of infant preference for Motherese speech. Infant Behavior and Development, 10, 279-293

Auditory-Visual Speech Perception

Babies can lip read. What role does vision play in speech perception for infants? Dr. Kuhl's research has shown that infants have a surprisingly sophisticated knowledge about not only audible speech, but the visual component to speech as well. Infants as young as 18 weeks of age, when presented with identical faces that are silently articulating different vowels ("ee" or "ah") but are hearing only one of those sounds played, will look significantly longer at the facial gesture which matches the sound heard. This shows that infants demonstrate a knowledge of the link between the sight and sound of speech at a very early age.

McGurk Effect:

The McGurk Effect refers to an auditory illusion in which visual cues to the syllable "ga" are combined with auditory cues to syllable "ba" resulting in the perception of "da" or "tha". Try listening to the following video with your eyes closed, then, after several repetitions, open your eyes to see how your perception changes in the presence of the visual stimulus.

McGurk Effect Video
[ Windows Media ] [ Quicktime ]

Language and Brain Plasticity (Infant ERP)

Exciting new technologies now allow scientists to see how the brain functions. As a complement to her behavioral research with infants, Dr. Kuhl's lab is investigating how the brain processes speech sounds. To conduct these studies, infants wear a hat like the one pictured to record the brain's electrical activity generated when they listen to various sounds. Our research shows that infants' brain responses to speech predict the speed of language acquisition.

Selected Publications:

Kuhl, P. K., Conboy, B. T., Coffey-Corina, S., Padden, D., Rivera-Gaxiola, M. & Nelson, T. (2008). Early phonetic perception as a gateway to language: New data and Native Language Magnet Theory, expanded (NLM-e). Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 363, 979-1000. Click here to receive a reprint

Conboy, B. T., Rivera-Gaxiola, M., Silva-Pereyra, J., & Kuhl, P. K. (2008). Event-related potential studies of early language processing at the phoneme, word, and sentence levels. In A. D. Friederici & G. Thierry (Eds.), Trends in Language Acquisition Research, 5, 23-64. Click here to receive a reprint

Rivera-Gaxiola, M., Silva-Pereyra, J., Klarman, L., Garcia-Sierra, A., Lara-Ayala, L., Cadena-Salazar, C. & Kuhl, P. K. (2007). Principal component analyses and scalp distribution of the auditory P150-250 and N250-550 to speech contrasts in Mexican and American infants. Developmental Neuropsychology, 31, 363-378. Click here to receive a reprint

Silva-Pereyra, J., Conboy, B.T., Klarman, L., & Kuhl, P. K. (2007). Grammatical processing without semantics? An event-related brain potential study of preschoolers using jabberwocky sentences. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 19, 1-16. Click here to receive a reprint

Rivera-Gaxiola, M., Klarman, L., Garcia-Sierra, A. & Kuhl, P. K. (2005). Neural patterns to speech and vocabulary growth in American infants. NeuroReport, 16, 495-498. Click here to receive a reprint

Rivera-Gaxiola, M., Silva-Pereyra, J. and Kuhl, P. K. (2005). Brain potentials to native and non-native speech contrasts in seven- and eleven-month-old American infants. Developmental Science, 8,162-173. Click here to receive a reprint

Silva_Pereyra, J., Klarman, L., Lin, J. -F. & Kuhl, P. K. (2005). Sentence processing in 30-month old children: An ERP study. NeuroReport, 16, 645-648. Click here to receive a reprint

Silva-Pereyra, J., Rivera-Gaxiola, M., and Kuhl, P.K. (2005). An event-related brain potential study of sentence comprehension in preschoolers: Semantic and morphosyntatic processing. Cognitive Brain Research, 23, 247-258. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K. (1998). Effects of language experience on speech perception. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 103, 29-31.

Autism

Dr. Kuhl's laboratory is using early measures of language to study young children with autism. These tests show large differences between young children with autism and typically-developing children on the early precursors to language. Speech measures may provide early markers of autism and allow early intervention and treatment.

Selected Publications:

Coffey-Corina, S., Padden, D., Kuhl, P. K. & Dawson, G. (2008). ERPs to words correlate with behavioral measures in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 123, 3742. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K., Coffey-Corina, S., Padden, D., and Dawson, G. (2005). Links between social and linguistic processing of speech in preschoolchildren with autism: behavioral and electrophysiological evidence. Developmental Science, 8, F1-F12. Click here to receive a reprint

Dawson, G., Osterling, J., Meltzoff, A.N., and Kuhl, P. (2000). Case studyof the development of an infant with autism from birth to 2 years of age.Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 21, 299-313. Click here to receive a reprint

Computer Learning and Speech

Computer speech recognition is a topic of great interest for academics and business people. Dr. Kuhl's laboratory is addressing machine learning by presenting infant-directed natural language to neural network models to see if it improves learning.

Computer models of adult- and infant-directed speech

de Boer & Kuhl, 2003
Click an image to play the computer animation (QuickTime)

Selected Publication:

de Boer, B. & Kuhl, P. K. (2003). Investigating the role ofinfant-directed speech with a computer model, Auditory Research LettersOn-Line (ARLO), 4, 129-134. Click here to receive a reprint

Predicting Later Language from Early Speech Perception

Dr. Kuhl's laboratory is investigating the relationship between early speech and later language. We are testing the hypothesis that early speech perception learning is a significant predictor of language abilities in early childhood. Dr. Kuhl's work suggests a new view early phonetic learning results in "neural commitment" to native language phonetic units that optimizes the acquisition of words in the native language.

Selected Publications:

Kuhl, P. K., Conboy, B. T., Padden, D., Nelson, T. & Pruitt, J. (2005). Early speech perception and later language development: Implications for the "critical period." Language Learning and Development, 1, 237-264. Click here to receive a reprint

Tsao, F.-M., Liu, H.-M., & Kuhl, P. K. (2004) Speech perception in infancy predicts language development in the second year of life: A longitudinal study. Child Development, 75, 1067-1084. Click here to receive a reprint

Kuhl, P. K. (2004). Early language acquisition: Cracking the speech code. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 5, 831-843. Click here to receive a reprint

Wang, Y. & Kuhl, P. K. (2003). Evaluating the "critical period" hypothesis: Perceptual learning of Mandarin tones in American adultsand American children at 6, 10, and 14 years of age. Proceedings of the15th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 1537-1540. Click here to receive a reprint

Adults, Infants and Teens Using fMRI and MEG

Adult studies using fMRI and MEG techniques are also underway in Dr. Kuhl's laboratory. These studies tap hemodynamic (fMRI) and electromagnetic (MEG) measures of language function in adults and teens.

Listen to NPR interview

Watch Baby MEG Movie
[ View with Quicktime]

See Baby MEG Data

Selected Publications:

Imada, T, Zhang, Y.,Cheour, M., Taulu, S., Ahonen, A., & Kuhl, P. K.. (2006) Infant speech perception activates Broca�s area: a developmental magnetoencephalography study. NeuroReport, 17, 957-962. Click here to receive a reprint

Zhang, Y., Kuhl, P. K., Imada, T., Kotani, M., & Tohkura, Y. (2005). Effects of language experience: Neural Commitment to language-specific auditory patters.NeuroImage. 26. 703-720. Click here to receive a reprint

Cheour, M., Imada, T., Taulu, S., Ahonen, A., Salonen, J., and Kuhl, P.K. (2004) Magnetoencephalography (MEG) is feasible for infant assessment of auditorydiscrimination. Experimental Neurology, 190, 44-51. Click here to receive a reprint

International Investigators

Dr. Kuhl has assembled an international team of investigators to produce this research, in addition to the undergraduate, graduate, and post-doctoral students (numbering over 20) who work in her laboratories.

World Investigators