WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.000 I want you to take a look at this baby. 00:00:03.000 --> 00:00:06.000 What you're drawn to are her eyes 00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:09.000 and the skin you love to touch. 00:00:09.000 --> 00:00:12.000 But today I'm going to talk to you about something you can't see -- 00:00:12.000 --> 00:00:15.000 what's going on up in that little brain of hers. 00:00:16.000 --> 00:00:18.000 The modern tools of neuroscience 00:00:18.000 --> 00:00:21.000 are demonstrating to us that what's going on up there 00:00:21.000 --> 00:00:24.000 is nothing short of rocket science. 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:26.000 And what we're learning 00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:28.000 is going to shed some light 00:00:28.000 --> 00:00:31.000 on what the romantic writers and poets 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:34.000 described as the "celestial openness" 00:00:34.000 --> 00:00:36.000 of the child's mind. NOTE Paragraph 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:38.000 What we see here 00:00:38.000 --> 00:00:40.000 is a mother in India, 00:00:40.000 --> 00:00:42.000 and she's speaking Koro, 00:00:42.000 --> 00:00:44.000 which is a newly discovered language. 00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:46.000 And she's talking to her baby. 00:00:46.000 --> 00:00:48.000 What this mother -- 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:51.000 and the 800 people who speak Koro in the world -- 00:00:51.000 --> 00:00:54.000 understands [is] that, to preserve this language, 00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:57.000 they need to speak it to the babies. 00:00:57.000 --> 00:01:00.000 And therein lies a critical puzzle. 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:02.000 Why is it that you can't preserve a language 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:05.000 by speaking to you and I, to the adults? 00:01:05.000 --> 00:01:08.000 Well, it's got to do with your brain. 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:10.000 What we see here 00:01:10.000 --> 00:01:13.000 is that language has a critical period for learning. 00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:16.000 The way to read this slide is to look at your age on the horizontal axis. 00:01:16.000 --> 00:01:19.000 (Laughter) 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:21.000 And you'll see on the vertical 00:01:21.000 --> 00:01:23.000 your skill at acquiring a second language. 00:01:23.000 --> 00:01:25.000 Babies and children are geniuses 00:01:25.000 --> 00:01:27.000 until they turn seven, 00:01:27.000 --> 00:01:30.000 and then there's a systematic decline. 00:01:30.000 --> 00:01:32.000 After puberty, we fall off the map. 00:01:32.000 --> 00:01:35.000 No scientists dispute this curve, 00:01:35.000 --> 00:01:37.000 but laboratories all over the world 00:01:37.000 --> 00:01:40.000 are trying to figure out why it works this way. NOTE Paragraph 00:01:40.000 --> 00:01:42.000 Work in my lab is focused 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:44.000 on the first critical period in development -- 00:01:44.000 --> 00:01:46.000 and that is the period in which 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:49.000 babies try to master which sounds are used in their language. 00:01:49.000 --> 00:01:52.000 We think, by studying how the sounds are learned, 00:01:52.000 --> 00:01:54.000 we'll have a model for the rest of language, 00:01:54.000 --> 00:01:57.000 and perhaps for critical periods that may exist in childhood 00:01:57.000 --> 00:01:59.000 for social, emotional 00:01:59.000 --> 00:02:01.000 and cognitive development. 00:02:01.000 --> 00:02:03.000 So we've been studying the babies 00:02:03.000 --> 00:02:05.000 using a technique that we're using all over the world 00:02:05.000 --> 00:02:07.000 and the sounds of all languages. 00:02:07.000 --> 00:02:09.000 The baby sits on a parent's lap, 00:02:09.000 --> 00:02:11.000 and we train them to turn their heads when a sound changes -- 00:02:11.000 --> 00:02:13.000 like from "ah" to "ee." 00:02:13.000 --> 00:02:15.000 If they do so at the appropriate time, 00:02:15.000 --> 00:02:17.000 the black box lights up 00:02:17.000 --> 00:02:19.000 and a panda bear pounds a drum. 00:02:19.000 --> 00:02:21.000 A six-monther adores the task. NOTE Paragraph 00:02:21.000 --> 00:02:23.000 What have we learned? 00:02:23.000 --> 00:02:25.000 Well, babies all over the world 00:02:25.000 --> 00:02:27.000 are what I like to describe 00:02:27.000 --> 00:02:29.000 as "citizens of the world." 00:02:29.000 --> 00:02:32.000 They can discriminate all the sounds of all languages, 00:02:32.000 --> 00:02:35.000 no matter what country we're testing and what language we're using, 00:02:35.000 --> 00:02:38.000 and that's remarkable because you and I can't do that. 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:40.000 We're culture-bound listeners. 00:02:40.000 --> 00:02:42.000 We can discriminate the sounds of our own language, 00:02:42.000 --> 00:02:44.000 but not those of foreign languages. 00:02:44.000 --> 00:02:46.000 So the question arises: 00:02:46.000 --> 00:02:48.000 when do those citizens of the world 00:02:48.000 --> 00:02:51.000 turn into the language-bound listeners that we are? 00:02:51.000 --> 00:02:54.000 And the answer: before their first birthdays. 00:02:54.000 --> 00:02:57.000 What you see here is performance on that head-turn task 00:02:57.000 --> 00:02:59.000 for babies tested in Tokyo and the United States, 00:02:59.000 --> 00:03:01.000 here in Seattle, 00:03:01.000 --> 00:03:03.000 as they listened to "ra" and "la" -- 00:03:03.000 --> 00:03:06.000 sounds important to English, but not to Japanese. 00:03:06.000 --> 00:03:09.000 So at six to eight months the babies are totally equivalent. 00:03:09.000 --> 00:03:12.000 Two months later something incredible occurs. 00:03:12.000 --> 00:03:14.000 The babies in the United States are getting a lot better, 00:03:14.000 --> 00:03:16.000 babies in Japan are getting a lot worse, 00:03:16.000 --> 00:03:18.000 but both of those groups of babies 00:03:18.000 --> 00:03:21.000 are preparing for exactly the language that they are going to learn. NOTE Paragraph 00:03:21.000 --> 00:03:24.000 So the question is: what's happening 00:03:24.000 --> 00:03:26.000 during this critical two-month period? 00:03:26.000 --> 00:03:28.000 This is the critical period for sound development, 00:03:28.000 --> 00:03:30.000 but what's going on up there? 00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:32.000 So there are two things going on. 00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:35.000 The first is that the babies are listening intently to us, 00:03:35.000 --> 00:03:38.000 and they're taking statistics as they listen to us talk -- 00:03:38.000 --> 00:03:40.000 they're taking statistics. 00:03:40.000 --> 00:03:43.000 So listen to two mothers speaking motherese -- 00:03:43.000 --> 00:03:46.000 the universal language we use when we talk to kids -- 00:03:46.000 --> 00:03:49.000 first in English and then in Japanese. NOTE Paragraph 00:03:49.000 --> 00:03:52.000 (Video) English Mother: Ah, I love your big blue eyes -- 00:03:52.000 --> 00:03:55.000 so pretty and nice. NOTE Paragraph 00:03:56.000 --> 00:04:02.000 Japanese Mother: [Japanese] NOTE Paragraph 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:04.000 Patricia Kuhl: During the production of speech, 00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:06.000 when babies listen, 00:04:06.000 --> 00:04:08.000 what they're doing is taking statistics 00:04:08.000 --> 00:04:11.000 on the language that they hear. 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:14.000 And those distributions grow. 00:04:14.000 --> 00:04:16.000 And what we've learned 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:19.000 is that babies are sensitive to the statistics, 00:04:19.000 --> 00:04:22.000 and the statistics of Japanese and English are very, very different. 00:04:22.000 --> 00:04:25.000 English has a lot of Rs and Ls. 00:04:25.000 --> 00:04:27.000 The distribution shows. 00:04:27.000 --> 00:04:29.000 And the distribution of Japanese is totally different, 00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:32.000 where we see a group of intermediate sounds, 00:04:32.000 --> 00:04:35.000 which is known as the Japanese "R." 00:04:35.000 --> 00:04:37.000 So babies absorb 00:04:37.000 --> 00:04:39.000 the statistics of the language 00:04:39.000 --> 00:04:41.000 and it changes their brains; 00:04:41.000 --> 00:04:43.000 it changes them from the citizens of the world 00:04:43.000 --> 00:04:46.000 to the culture-bound listeners that we are. 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:48.000 But we as adults 00:04:48.000 --> 00:04:50.000 are no longer absorbing those statistics. 00:04:50.000 --> 00:04:53.000 We're governed by the representations in memory 00:04:53.000 --> 00:04:56.000 that were formed early in development. NOTE Paragraph 00:04:56.000 --> 00:04:58.000 So what we're seeing here 00:04:58.000 --> 00:05:01.000 is changing our models of what the critical period is about. 00:05:01.000 --> 00:05:04.000 We're arguing from a mathematical standpoint 00:05:04.000 --> 00:05:07.000 that the learning of language material may slow down 00:05:07.000 --> 00:05:09.000 when our distributions stabilize. 00:05:09.000 --> 00:05:12.000 It's raising lots of questions about bilingual people. 00:05:12.000 --> 00:05:16.000 Bilinguals must keep two sets of statistics in mind at once 00:05:16.000 --> 00:05:19.000 and flip between them, one after the other, 00:05:19.000 --> 00:05:21.000 depending on who they're speaking to. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:21.000 --> 00:05:23.000 So we asked ourselves, 00:05:23.000 --> 00:05:26.000 can the babies take statistics on a brand new language? 00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:28.000 And we tested this by exposing American babies 00:05:28.000 --> 00:05:30.000 who'd never heard a second language 00:05:30.000 --> 00:05:33.000 to Mandarin for the first time during the critical period. 00:05:33.000 --> 00:05:35.000 We knew that, when monolinguals were tested 00:05:35.000 --> 00:05:38.000 in Taipei and Seattle on the Mandarin sounds, 00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:40.000 they showed the same pattern. 00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:42.000 Six to eight months, they're totally equivalent. 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:45.000 Two months later, something incredible happens. 00:05:45.000 --> 00:05:48.000 But the Taiwanese babies are getting better, not the American babies. 00:05:48.000 --> 00:05:51.000 What we did was expose American babies during this period 00:05:51.000 --> 00:05:53.000 to Mandarin. 00:05:53.000 --> 00:05:56.000 It was like having Mandarin relatives come and visit for a month 00:05:56.000 --> 00:05:58.000 and move into your house 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:00.000 and talk to the babies for 12 sessions. 00:06:00.000 --> 00:06:02.000 Here's what it looked like in the laboratory. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:02.000 --> 00:06:24.000 (Video) Mandarin Speaker: [Mandarin] NOTE Paragraph 00:06:24.000 --> 00:06:26.000 PK: So what have we done to their little brains? 00:06:26.000 --> 00:06:29.000 (Laughter) 00:06:29.000 --> 00:06:31.000 We had to run a control group 00:06:31.000 --> 00:06:33.000 to make sure that just coming into the laboratory 00:06:33.000 --> 00:06:35.000 didn't improve your Mandarin skills. 00:06:35.000 --> 00:06:37.000 So a group of babies came in and listened to English. 00:06:37.000 --> 00:06:39.000 And we can see from the graph 00:06:39.000 --> 00:06:41.000 that exposure to English didn't improve their Mandarin. 00:06:41.000 --> 00:06:43.000 But look at what happened to the babies 00:06:43.000 --> 00:06:45.000 exposed to Mandarin for 12 sessions. 00:06:45.000 --> 00:06:47.000 They were as good as the babies in Taiwan 00:06:47.000 --> 00:06:50.000 who'd been listening for 10-and-a-half months. 00:06:50.000 --> 00:06:52.000 What it demonstrated 00:06:52.000 --> 00:06:54.000 is that babies take statistics on a new language. 00:06:54.000 --> 00:06:58.000 Whatever you put in front of them, they'll take statistics on. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:00.000 But we wondered what role 00:07:00.000 --> 00:07:02.000 the human being played 00:07:02.000 --> 00:07:04.000 in this learning exercise. 00:07:04.000 --> 00:07:06.000 So we ran another group of babies 00:07:06.000 --> 00:07:09.000 in which the kids got the same dosage, the same 12 sessions, 00:07:09.000 --> 00:07:11.000 but over a television set 00:07:11.000 --> 00:07:14.000 and another group of babies who had just audio exposure 00:07:14.000 --> 00:07:16.000 and looked at a teddy bear on the screen. 00:07:16.000 --> 00:07:19.000 What did we do to their brains? 00:07:19.000 --> 00:07:22.000 What you see here is the audio result -- 00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:24.000 no learning whatsoever -- 00:07:24.000 --> 00:07:27.000 and the video result -- 00:07:27.000 --> 00:07:29.000 no learning whatsoever. 00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:31.000 It takes a human being 00:07:31.000 --> 00:07:33.000 for babies to take their statistics. 00:07:33.000 --> 00:07:35.000 The social brain is controlling 00:07:35.000 --> 00:07:37.000 when the babies are taking their statistics. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:37.000 --> 00:07:39.000 We want to get inside the brain 00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:41.000 and see this thing happening 00:07:41.000 --> 00:07:43.000 as babies are in front of televisions, 00:07:43.000 --> 00:07:45.000 as opposed to in front of human beings. 00:07:45.000 --> 00:07:47.000 Thankfully, we have a new machine, 00:07:47.000 --> 00:07:49.000 magnetoencephalography, 00:07:49.000 --> 00:07:51.000 that allows us to do this. 00:07:51.000 --> 00:07:53.000 It looks like a hair dryer from Mars. 00:07:53.000 --> 00:07:55.000 But it's completely safe, 00:07:55.000 --> 00:07:58.000 completely non-invasive and silent. 00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:00.000 We're looking at millimeter accuracy 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:02.000 with regard to spatial 00:08:02.000 --> 00:08:04.000 and millisecond accuracy 00:08:04.000 --> 00:08:06.000 using 306 SQUIDs -- 00:08:06.000 --> 00:08:08.000 these are Superconducting 00:08:08.000 --> 00:08:10.000 QUantum Interference Devices -- 00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:12.000 to pick up the magnetic fields 00:08:12.000 --> 00:08:14.000 that change as we do our thinking. 00:08:14.000 --> 00:08:16.000 We're the first in the world 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:18.000 to record babies 00:08:18.000 --> 00:08:20.000 in an MEG machine 00:08:20.000 --> 00:08:22.000 while they are learning. NOTE Paragraph 00:08:22.000 --> 00:08:24.000 So this is little Emma. 00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:26.000 She's a six-monther. 00:08:26.000 --> 00:08:28.000 And she's listening to various languages 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:31.000 in the earphones that are in her ears. 00:08:31.000 --> 00:08:33.000 You can see, she can move around. 00:08:33.000 --> 00:08:35.000 We're tracking her head 00:08:35.000 --> 00:08:37.000 with little pellets in a cap, 00:08:37.000 --> 00:08:40.000 so she's free to move completely unconstrained. 00:08:40.000 --> 00:08:42.000 It's a technical tour de force. 00:08:42.000 --> 00:08:44.000 What are we seeing? 00:08:44.000 --> 00:08:46.000 We're seeing the baby brain. 00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:49.000 As the baby hears a word in her language 00:08:49.000 --> 00:08:51.000 the auditory areas light up, 00:08:51.000 --> 00:08:53.000 and then subsequently areas surrounding it 00:08:53.000 --> 00:08:56.000 that we think are related to coherence, 00:08:56.000 --> 00:08:58.000 getting the brain coordinated with its different areas, 00:08:58.000 --> 00:09:00.000 and causality, 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:03.000 one brain area causing another to activate. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:03.000 --> 00:09:05.000 We are embarking 00:09:05.000 --> 00:09:08.000 on a grand and golden age 00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:11.000 of knowledge about child's brain development. 00:09:11.000 --> 00:09:13.000 We're going to be able to see a child's brain 00:09:13.000 --> 00:09:15.000 as they experience an emotion, 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:17.000 as they learn to speak and read, 00:09:17.000 --> 00:09:19.000 as they solve a math problem, 00:09:19.000 --> 00:09:21.000 as they have an idea. 00:09:21.000 --> 00:09:24.000 And we're going to be able to invent brain-based interventions 00:09:24.000 --> 00:09:27.000 for children who have difficulty learning. 00:09:27.000 --> 00:09:30.000 Just as the poets and writers described, 00:09:30.000 --> 00:09:32.000 we're going to be able to see, I think, 00:09:32.000 --> 00:09:34.000 that wondrous openness, 00:09:34.000 --> 00:09:36.000 utter and complete openness, 00:09:36.000 --> 00:09:39.000 of the mind of a child. 00:09:39.000 --> 00:09:41.000 In investigating the child's brain, 00:09:41.000 --> 00:09:43.000 we're going to uncover deep truths 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:45.000 about what it means to be human, 00:09:45.000 --> 00:09:47.000 and in the process, 00:09:47.000 --> 00:09:49.000 we may be able to help keep our own minds open to learning 00:09:49.000 --> 00:09:51.000 for our entire lives. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:51.000 --> 00:09:53.000 Thank you. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:53.000 --> 00:09:56.000 (Applause)