Event-related potentials during literacy acquisition

Abstract

Literacy is a complex and multidimensional phenomenon that has been well studied in psychology and pedagogy. Neurophysiologists try to understand the mechanisms of writing and reading acquisition by analyzing different linguistic processes. In this paper, we review the data that were revealed by using the event-related potentials (ERPs) method in the light of spelling, lexical, semantic and syntactic aspects of literacy, as well as changes in the components of ERPs in children and adults during language acquisition and in dyslexia, the most studied reading disorder. The ERPs method can help to understand both the general, universal neural underpinnings of literacy development and the unique features of different languages.

Keywords

• literacy acquisition
• reading
• error recognition
• dyslexia
• event related potentials
• n170
• n400
• p600