Verbal cues effectively orient children's auditory attention in a CV-syllable dichotic listening paradigm

In their groundbreaking work featuring verbal dichotic listening tasks, Mondor and Bryden showed that tone cues do not enhance children's attentional orienting, in contrast to adults. The magnitude of the children's right-ear advantage was not attenuated when their attention was directed to the left ear. Verbal cues did, however, appear to favour the orientation of attention at around 10 years, although stimulus-onset asynchronies (SOAs), which ranged between 450 and 750 ms, were not rigorously controlled. The aim of our study was therefore to investigate the role of both types of cues in a typical CV-syllable dichotic listening task administered to 8- to 10-year-olds, applying a protocol as similar as possible to that used by Mondor and Bryden, but controlling for SOA as well as for cued ear. Results confirmed that verbal cues are more effective than tone cues in orienting children's attention. However, in contrast to adults, no effect of SOA was observed. We discuss the relative difficulty young children have processing CV syllables, as well as the role of top-down processes in attentional orienting abilities.