Training by visual identification and writing leads to different visual word expertise N170 effects in preliterate Chinese children

• Four- to five-year-old preliterate children were trained to read and write Chinese characters.
• The N170 expertise for Chinese characters in preliterate children emerged rapidly after training.
• Visual identification and writing experience have different influences on N170 expertise for Chinese characters.

The N170 component of EEG evoked by visual words is an index of perceptual expertise for the visual word across different writing systems. In the present study, we investigated whether these N170 markers for Chinese, a very complex script, could emerge quickly after short-term learning (∼100 min) in young Chinese children, and whether early writing experience can enhance the acquisition of these neural markers for expertise. Two groups of preschool children received visual identification and free writing training respectively. Short-term character training resulted in selective enhancement of the N170 to characters, consistent with normal expert processing. Visual identification training resulted in increased N170 amplitude to characters in the right hemisphere, and N170 amplitude differences between characters and faces were decreased; whereas the amplitude difference between characters and tools increased. Writing training led to the disappearance of an initial amplitude difference between characters and faces in the right hemisphere. These results show that N170 markers for visual expertise emerge rapidly in young children after word learning, independent of the type of script young children learn; and visual identification and writing produce different effects.