ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Hum. Neurosci.
Sec. Speech and Language
Reading Skills Modulate the Audiovisual Congruency Effect in Orthographic Processing in Children: An ERP study
Provisionally accepted
Christina G. Lutz1,2,3,4*
Seline Coraj1,2,5,6
Aline Kressebuch1
Sarah V. Di Pietro1,2,7
Iliana I. Karipidis1,2,7Silvia Brem1,2,7*- 1Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital of Psychiatry, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
- 2Zentrum fur Neurowissenschaften Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
- 3Eidgenossische Technische Hochschule Zurich Departement Gesundheitswissenschaften und Technologie, Zürich, Switzerland
- 4Present address: Working Memory, Cognition, and Development Group, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
- 5Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation, Frauenfeld, Switzerland
- 6UniversitatsSpital Zurich Klinik fur Neonatologie, Zürich, Switzerland
- 7University Research Priority Program (URPP), Adaptive Brain Circuits in Development and Learning (AdaBD), University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
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Integration of written and spoken information is crucial for reading acquisition. Individuals with reading difficulties exhibit deficiencies in audiovisual (AV) congruency processing. The timeline of AV congruency processing in children and the influence of reading skills on this process remain, however, largely unclear. Therefore, we examined when and how reading skills modulate AV congruency processing for orthographic (words, pseudowords) and non-orthographic (object) conditions. Eighty-two native German-speaking 2nd-3rd graders completed an explicit task involving the matching of AV congruent and incongruent orthographic and non-orthographic stimuli, while EEG was recorded. Behaviorally, poorer reading skills were associated with lower performance and slower responses for orthographic conditions. Neurally, topographic EEG analyses revealed congruency effects emerging after 300 ms for orthographic conditions and around 200 ms for objects. ERP analyses showed that reading skills modulated the N400 incongruency effect more strongly for orthographic than non-orthographic stimuli. In summary, poorer reading skills were associated with slower AV matching and a weaker N400 incongruency effect for orthographic conditions. These findings suggest that while reading skills might not broadly affect AV congruency processing, they critically impact the AV congruency processing of orthographic information, potentially hindering struggling readers' ability to effectively use preceding auditory information for processing print.
Keywords: audiovisual congruency processing, Children, developmental dyslexia, Event-related potentials, Incongruency effect, reading
Received: 04 Aug 2025; Accepted: 13 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Lutz, Coraj, Kressebuch, Di Pietro, Karipidis and Brem. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Christina G. Lutz
Silvia Brem
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