Domain-general syntax: The crucial role of tool-use motor training to improve syntactic comprehension in language, in adults and children
Abstract
Language syntax can be defined as the set of rules and dependency mechanisms that link words together to form correct sentences. It allows to construct complex sentences with different levels of nesting, such as the relative clause: “The writer [who admires the poet] takes the paper”.
Goal-directed actions can be described by a syntactic analogy: for example, moving a peg (approach fingers, grasp, lift, move, place, release) involves dependency mechanisms between the different elements of the operating chain. The motor syntactic complexity can be increased by performing the same action sequence while using a tool, like pliers.
A domain-general syntax may be at work in the functioning of language and motor skills. In support of this hypothesis, it has recently been shown that 1) the syntactic component of these two domains shares common brain circuits, and 2) the processing of language syntax improves after motor training with a tool.
This presentation will describe the motor conditions that produce this learning transfer in adults, with a behavioural study in which we manipulated the complexity of motor syntax over two orthogonal dimensions: the number of movements and the effector. 80 participants underwent our protocol consisting of a language syntax test before and after motor training. Our results show that tool use, compared to manual training, appears to be crucial in order to observe learning transfer to the language domain: no matter the action complexity, participants performed significantly better only after tool-use training, and not manual training, compared to before [Pre-test, d’ = 1.91 ± 0.04; Post-test, d’ = 2.10 ± 0.05; P < 0.001]). Action complexity might enhance this effect . Our findings open the question about the ontogenetic development of the domain-general syntax, which we have addressed by adapting our protocol in an ongoing study over 9- and 11-year-old children.
Domains
Cognitive science
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