Highlights The adult brain tracks the modulation of the amplitude of speech, i.e. its envelope. We tested if preverbal infants, i.e. newborns & 6-month-olds, track the speech envelope. Infants track the envelope phase at both ages in the native language & in unfamiliar languages. Infants track the envelope amplitude in the native language at birth but not at 6 months. This suggests that phase tracking is unrelated to language experience, whereas amplitude tracking is shaped by experience.

No abstract