Group-wise sparse coding for the discovery of functional connectivity-based biomarkers in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder.

Preschool children are frequently exposed to environmental print (EP) containing visual words (e.g., “KFC” on advertising boards) in daily life. As a functional, ubiquitous, and appealing stimulus, EP increases opportunities for children to interact with words embedded in commercial logos and provides some of their earliest print experiences (; ). Previous training studies have demonstrated that children’s engagement with words in EP facilitates the development of reading ability. For instance, prior training interventions have indicated that employing EP as a training tool effectively promotes the development of literacy skills in young children (; ; ; ). After completing an eight-week EP-based training program, preschool children in the experimental group exhibited significantly better performance on reading assessments than their peers in the control group (). Similarly, implemented an eight-week training intervention, in which children were randomly assigned to three groups: an EP group, a standard print group (with identical words labels presented in black Century Gothic font), and a control group. Results indicated that following the training intervention, children in the EP group achieved higher scores on reading tests than those in the standard print group, whereas no significant difference in reading performance was observed between the standard print group and the control group (). A core premise underlying these training studies is that attention to words in EP is critical, given that attention to words serves as a key contributor to the development of children’s reading ability (). Consistent with this theoretical framework, a recent study employing eye-tracking technology by revealed that children who allocated a greater percentage of fixation time to words in EP and exhibited shorter latency of the first fixation performed better on word recognition test. In other words, children who directed more attention to words in EP demonstrated higher reading ability. Furthermore, attention to words in EP constitutes a major factor predictor of individual differences in children’s reading ability (). Collectively, these findings indicate that attention to words in EP is related to the development of reading ability in young children. This body of evidence also raises a fundamental question: how does attention to words in EP is related to reading ability in preschool children? Answering this question may further elucidate the role of EP in early reading development (; ; ). According to theoretical models of early reading acquisition (e.g., ; ; ; ,), orthographic knowledge may serve as a critical factor for explaining how attention to words in EP is related to reading ability in children. three-stage model of early reading development posits that children achieve reading proficiency through three sequential phases: namely, the logographic, alphabetic, and orthographic stages. During the logographic stage, children rely on salient visual cues to identify words (e.g., using the golden “M” logo to recognize the word “McDonald’s” in EP). provided evidence that preschool children already show sensitivity to letter position coding, indicating that a fundamental orthographic tuning mechanism is available and can be sharpened through repeated visual engagement with print. Such early-emerging sensitivity likely serves as the perceptual gateway through which sustained attention to words in EP translates into orthographic knowledge. Compared with alphabetic scripts, Chinese characters exhibit distinctive visuo-orthographic features. proposed that, in the Chinese writing system, orthographic knowledge refers to the understanding of the visual features of characters (such as strokes, radicals, and the rules governing radical positions) as well as the functions of components as semantic or phonetic radicals. Because Chinese word forms are hierarchically structured, orthographic awareness in Chinese encompasses several distinct levels. First, words are composed of strokes and radicals; consequently, learners must be able to recognize configurations containing strokes and radicals as words and to distinguish real words from non-existing ones. Second, because some radicals have flexible positions, learners must also acquire sensitivity to the legality of radical positions; different radicals can be combined into words with various structural types (e.g., top–bottom, left–right, enclosed), thereby requiring structural awareness. Orthographic knowledge develops hierarchically and progressively more precise (; ). For Chinese preschool children, higher-level orthographic knowledge—such as sensitivity to radical positions and radical combinatorial rules—has not yet been acquired (). However, lower-level orthographic knowledge is already developing: preschoolers show a good grasp of stroke-level features and can distinguish stimuli containing stroke patterns (e.g., real words and stroke combinations) from stimuli lacking s