Deficits in Top-Down Sensory Prediction in Infants At Risk due to Premature Birth

Abstract

SUMMARY A prominent theoretical view is that the brain is inherently predictive [1, 2] and that prediction helps drive the engine of development [3, 4]. While infants exhibit neural signatures of top-down, sensory prediction [5, 6], it must be established that deficits in early prediction alter developmental trajectories to start to infer causality between prediction and development. We investigated prediction in infants born prematurely, a leading cause of neuro-cognitive impairment worldwide [7]. Prematurity, independent of medical complications, leads to developmental disturbances [8, 9, 10, 11, 12] and a broad range of developmental delays [13, 14, 15, 16, 17]. Is an alteration in early prediction abilities the common cause? Using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), we measured top-down, sensory prediction in preterm infants (born <33 weeks) before infants exhibited clinically-identifiable developmental delays (6 months corrected age). While preterm infants had typical neural responses to presented visual stimuli, they exhibited altered neural responses to predicted visual stimuli. Importantly, a separate behavioral control confirmed that preterm infants detect pattern violations at the same rate as full-terms, establishing selectivity of this response to top-down predictions (e.g., not in learning an AV association). These findings suggest that top-down, sensory prediction plays a crucial role in development and deficits in this ability may be the reason why preterm infants experience altered developmental trajectories and are at-risk for poor developmental outcomes. Moreover, this work presents an opportunity for establishing a neuro-biomarker for early identification of infants at-risk and could guide to early intervention regimens.

Predictable Events Enhance Word Learning in Toddlers

“…Because their memory representations are fragile [43–45], consistency might be particularly helpful in building memory representations that can be carried from one learning moment to the next. Moreover, previous research suggests a positive link between developmental outcomes and the ability to make predictions [17, 18, 41], as well as the amount of predictability and stability present in young children’s home environments [46–49]. Our results suggest that these links may be due, in part, to the benefits of the predictability of input for learning.…”

“…Predictive processes play an important role in learning in many domains [1, 3, 4, 7], and recent proposals link disrupted predictive processes to developmental disabilities [17, 18]. Given the importance of predictive processes for developmental outcomes, it is important to understand how predictability affects learning.…”

Basal ganglia and autism – a translational perspective

“…In a remarkable manner, after several attempts and falls, the brain learns to walk and balance [Ehrlich & Schoppik, ; Glasauer & Straka, ]. Motor commands are initiated and adjusted dynamically based on internal and external sensory feedback to maintain gait, balance, and posture [Emberson, Boldin, Riccio, Guillet, & Aslin, ; Minshew et al, ]. After learning this habit, the skill can be performed automatically.…”

The emergence of top‐down, sensory prediction during learning in infancy: A comparison of full‐term and preterm infants

“…To this end, we compared neural learning trajectories between preterm and full-term infants. Specifically, since Emberson, Boldin, et al (2017) established that premature infants are unable to generate top-down predictions after learning, examining learning trajectories in this population provides an opportunity to investigate how top-down predictions shape the neural changes observed during learning. Crucially, Emberson, Boldin, et al (2017) established that the basic ability to form the audiovisual association is intact in our cohort of premature infants so any differences are attributable to the differences the top-down predictions that are impaired in this population.…”

“…Further highlighting potential differences in brain development are findings from Emberson, Boldin, Riccio, Guillet, and Aslin (2017) comparing top-down predictions in infants born full-term versus prematurely. In work examining neural response to violations of learned top-down predictions, they found that premature birth impaired infants' ability to generate top-down predictions but, in a separate behavioral control, prematurity was not found to affect the formation of audiovisual association or the detection of test trials.…”