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Interactive Auditory Experience Accelerates Maturation of Beta–Gamma Coupling in the Infant Brain

Poster Session F - Tuesday, March 10, 2026, 8:00 – 10:00 am PDT, Fairview/Kitsilano Ballroom

Beenish Mahmood¹, April A. Benasich¹; ¹Center for Molecular and Behavioral Neuroscience, Rutgers University

The infant brain undergoes rapid structural and functional reorganization during the first year of life, making it exceptionally plastic and responsive to auditory input. Early experience with sound provides critical scaffolding for neural systems that later support language and cognition. This poster examines how the timing and type of early auditory experience influence the maturation of spontaneous cortical oscillations during infancy using data collected from two different studies. In the first study, infants were assigned to one of three groups: Active (interactive auditory training at 4.5–6 months), Passive (exposure without interaction), or Naïve (no exposure). Analyses of spontaneous EEG revealed that early interactive experience accelerated developmental increases in beta and gamma power, promoting more mature cross-frequency relationships and suggesting enhanced functional organization of cortical networks. A second longitudinal study, which considered a separate group of infants, evaluated the impact of shifting the onset of auditory training to 6.5–8 months. Within-group maturation trajectory comparisons of trained (Active) and untrained (Naïve) cohorts demonstrated that intervention produced stronger and more sustained modulation of high-frequency oscillatory power in the Active group. Cross-frequency analyses further revealed similar developmental changes in beta–gamma coordination as observed in the first cohort, with early enhancement of coupling followed by an increase in independent frontal gamma power, indicative of local cortical maturation. This poster presents converging evidence that early interactive auditory experience enhances the neural dynamics underlying sensory and cognitive development, offering insight into mechanisms that may mitigate the risk of developmental language disorders.

Topic Area: LANGUAGE: Development & aging