The influence of the linguistic and reading environment on early neuropsychological development

Ramunė Dirvanskienė, Doctor of Neuropsychology, a lecturer at Vilnius University

The talk reviews neuroscience research on the influence of linguistic environment on early children’s development. It explains how the linguistic environment of families and educational institutions shape the brains of preschool children, highlights the differences between the academic and social skills of children living in a monolingual and bilingual environments, and shows the influence it has on children’s cognitive functions later on in life. Since children learn a language not only by communicating, but also by reading books with adults, the talk focuses on the process of reading, different types of reading and the influence the contents of the book have for the development of children’s brains.