China News Service, Hong Kong, July 14 (Reporter Xiaoxi Zhang) Linguists and pediatric specialists of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) have developed a new set of EEG test technology that can predict the language ability of babies after they grow up and help parents pass Early intervention and training improve the child's language ability.
Huang Junwen, director of the Institute of Brain and Cognition at CUHK, who led the research, said in an interview with a reporter from China News Agency on the 14th that he hopes that the test can be gradually extended to cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area to help more children in the Greater Bay Area. language skills.
On the same day, Huang Junwen and Professor Leung Tingxun of the Department of Pediatrics of the Faculty of Medicine of CUHK attended a press conference in Hong Kong to introduce the use of EEG test to predict the language ability of babies after they grow up.
Huang Junwen said that in recent years, the research team recruited a total of 118 infants of 12 months or younger whose mother tongue is Chinese and arranged for them to undergo an EEG test to check that the nervous system would be affected by the caregiver's hug and sleep. How does the sound of the Chinese sentence respond?
After about a year and a half, these young children knew how to use oral communication, and the research team arranged a language test to assess their language proficiency.
The research team then synthesized and analyzed the data obtained from EEG and language proficiency tests, and constructed a set of personal language development prediction calculation program.
Huang Junwen believes that because language ability is closely related to mental health, behavior adjustment, academic achievement and employment development, poor language ability may bring a long-term burden to individuals and society.
Because of the greatest plasticity of the nervous system of young children, early intervention is an effective way to improve language ability and prevent language barriers, and the earlier the intervention, the greater the effect and the economic benefits it brings.
"Parents generally don't want to deal with problems after they emerge. For this reason, predictive tools are very important." Huang Junwen pointed out that the application of this test can help children promote language development or receive related treatment as soon as possible.
Liang Tingxun said that the study uses neurometric data to build a new predictive model, which predicts performance far beyond other models that use traditional clinical indicators (such as birth weight and pregnancy weeks) to calculate.
He also believes that the test can have a wider range of applications, including inclusion in newborn infant hearing screening.
According to reports, the research has received funding support from the Hong Kong Innovation and Technology Fund, and the research results have been accepted for publication in the academic journal "American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology". Precise listening" EEG language development prediction technology.
Huang Junwen also expressed the hope that the study can be extended to cities in the Greater Bay Area in the future to help more children and parents in need. The test is also expected to be carried out in Shenzhen after normal personnel exchanges between Hong Kong and the Mainland resume.
(Finish)