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Mertel K, Dimitrijevic A, Thaut M. Can Music Enhance Working Memory and Speech in Noise Perception in Cochlear Implant Users? Design Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Behavioral and Electrophysiological Study. Audiol Res 2024; 14:611-624. [PMID: 39051196 PMCID: PMC11270222 DOI: 10.3390/audiolres14040052] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/28/2024] [Revised: 06/18/2024] [Accepted: 07/04/2024] [Indexed: 07/27/2024] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND A cochlear implant (CI) enables deaf people to understand speech but due to technical restrictions, users face great limitations in noisy conditions. Music training has been shown to augment shared auditory and cognitive neural networks for processing speech and music and to improve auditory-motor coupling, which benefits speech perception in noisy listening conditions. These are promising prerequisites for studying multi-modal neurologic music training (NMT) for speech-in-noise (SIN) perception in adult cochlear implant (CI) users. Furthermore, a better understanding of the neurophysiological correlates when performing working memory (WM) and SIN tasks after multi-modal music training with CI users may provide clinicians with a better understanding of optimal rehabilitation. METHODS Within 3 months, 81 post-lingual deafened adult CI recipients will undergo electrophysiological recordings and a four-week neurologic music therapy multi-modal training randomly assigned to one of three training focusses (pitch, rhythm, and timbre). Pre- and post-tests will analyze behavioral outcomes and apply a novel electrophysiological measurement approach that includes neural tracking to speech and alpha oscillation modulations to the sentence-final-word-identification-and-recall test (SWIR-EEG). Expected outcome: Short-term multi-modal music training will enhance WM and SIN performance in post-lingual deafened adult CI recipients and will be reflected in greater neural tracking and alpha oscillation modulations in prefrontal areas. Prospectively, outcomes could contribute to understanding the relationship between cognitive functioning and SIN besides the technical deficits of the CI. Targeted clinical application of music training for post-lingual deafened adult CI carriers to significantly improve SIN and positively impact the quality of life can be realized.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kathrin Mertel
- Music and Health Research Collaboratory (MaHRC), University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 1C5, Canada;
| | - Andrew Dimitrijevic
- Sunnybrook Cochlear Implant Program, Sunnybrook Hospital, Toronto, ON M4N 3M5, Canada;
| | - Michael Thaut
- Music and Health Research Collaboratory (MaHRC), University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 1C5, Canada;
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2
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Pedapati EV, Ethridge LE, Liu Y, Liu R, Sweeney JA, DeStefano LA, Miyakoshi M, Razak K, Schmitt LM, Moore DR, Gilbert DL, Wu SW, Smith E, Shaffer RC, Dominick KC, Horn PS, Binder D, Erickson CA. Frontal Cortex Hyperactivation and Gamma Desynchrony in Fragile X Syndrome: Correlates of Auditory Hypersensitivity. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2024:2024.06.13.598957. [PMID: 38915683 PMCID: PMC11195233 DOI: 10.1101/2024.06.13.598957] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/26/2024]
Abstract
Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is an X-linked disorder that often leads to intellectual disability, anxiety, and sensory hypersensitivity. While sound sensitivity (hyperacusis) is a distressing symptom in FXS, its neural basis is not well understood. It is postulated that hyperacusis may stem from temporal lobe hyperexcitability or dysregulation in top-down modulation. Studying the neural mechanisms underlying sound sensitivity in FXS using scalp electroencephalography (EEG) is challenging because the temporal and frontal regions have overlapping neural projections that are difficult to differentiate. To overcome this challenge, we conducted EEG source analysis on a group of 36 individuals with FXS and 39 matched healthy controls. Our goal was to characterize the spatial and temporal properties of the response to an auditory chirp stimulus. Our results showed that males with FXS exhibit excessive activation in the frontal cortex in response to the stimulus onset, which may reflect changes in top-down modulation of auditory processing. Additionally, during the chirp stimulus, individuals with FXS demonstrated a reduction in typical gamma phase synchrony, along with an increase in asynchronous gamma power, across multiple regions, most strongly in temporal cortex. Consistent with these findings, we observed a decrease in the signal-to-noise ratio, estimated by the ratio of synchronous to asynchronous gamma activity, in individuals with FXS. Furthermore, this ratio was highly correlated with performance in an auditory attention task. Compared to controls, males with FXS demonstrated elevated bidirectional frontotemporal information flow at chirp onset. The evidence indicates that both temporal lobe hyperexcitability and disruptions in top-down regulation play a role in auditory sensitivity disturbances in FXS. These findings have the potential to guide the development of therapeutic targets and back-translation strategies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ernest V Pedapati
- Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Division of Neurology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Lauren E Ethridge
- Department of Pediatrics, Section on Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, United States
- Department of Psychology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, United States
| | - Yanchen Liu
- Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Rui Liu
- Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - John A Sweeney
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Lisa A DeStefano
- Division of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Makoto Miyakoshi
- Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Khaleel Razak
- Department of Psychology, University of California, Riverside, Riverside, CA, United States
| | - Lauren M Schmitt
- Division of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - David R Moore
- Communication Sciences Research Center, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Manchester Centre for Audiology and Deafness, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
| | - Donald L Gilbert
- Division of Neurology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Steve W Wu
- Division of Neurology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Elizabeth Smith
- Division of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Rebecca C Shaffer
- Division of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Kelli C Dominick
- Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Paul S Horn
- Division of Neurology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
| | - Devin Binder
- Division of Biomedical Sciences, School of Medicine, University of California, Riverside, United States
| | - Craig A Erickson
- Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH, United States
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3
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Tune S, Obleser J. Neural attentional filters and behavioural outcome follow independent individual trajectories over the adult lifespan. eLife 2024; 12:RP92079. [PMID: 38470243 DOI: 10.7554/elife.92079] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/13/2024] Open
Abstract
Preserved communication abilities promote healthy ageing. To this end, the age-typical loss of sensory acuity might in part be compensated for by an individual's preserved attentional neural filtering. Is such a compensatory brain-behaviour link longitudinally stable? Can it predict individual change in listening behaviour? We here show that individual listening behaviour and neural filtering ability follow largely independent developmental trajectories modelling electroencephalographic and behavioural data of N = 105 ageing individuals (39-82 y). First, despite the expected decline in hearing-threshold-derived sensory acuity, listening-task performance proved stable over 2 y. Second, neural filtering and behaviour were correlated only within each separate measurement timepoint (T1, T2). Longitudinally, however, our results raise caution on attention-guided neural filtering metrics as predictors of individual trajectories in listening behaviour: neither neural filtering at T1 nor its 2-year change could predict individual 2-year behavioural change, under a combination of modelling strategies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sarah Tune
- Center of Brain, Behavior, and Metabolism, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
| | - Jonas Obleser
- Center of Brain, Behavior, and Metabolism, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
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Zoefel B, Kösem A. Neural tracking of continuous acoustics: properties, speech-specificity and open questions. Eur J Neurosci 2024; 59:394-414. [PMID: 38151889 DOI: 10.1111/ejn.16221] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/27/2023] [Revised: 11/17/2023] [Accepted: 11/22/2023] [Indexed: 12/29/2023]
Abstract
Human speech is a particularly relevant acoustic stimulus for our species, due to its role of information transmission during communication. Speech is inherently a dynamic signal, and a recent line of research focused on neural activity following the temporal structure of speech. We review findings that characterise neural dynamics in the processing of continuous acoustics and that allow us to compare these dynamics with temporal aspects in human speech. We highlight properties and constraints that both neural and speech dynamics have, suggesting that auditory neural systems are optimised to process human speech. We then discuss the speech-specificity of neural dynamics and their potential mechanistic origins and summarise open questions in the field.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benedikt Zoefel
- Centre de Recherche Cerveau et Cognition (CerCo), CNRS UMR 5549, Toulouse, France
- Université de Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France
| | - Anne Kösem
- Lyon Neuroscience Research Center (CRNL), INSERM U1028, Bron, France
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Slugocki C, Kuk F, Korhonen P. Alpha-Band Dynamics of Hearing Aid Wearers Performing the Repeat-Recall Test (RRT). Trends Hear 2024; 28:23312165231222098. [PMID: 38549287 PMCID: PMC10981257 DOI: 10.1177/23312165231222098] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2023] [Revised: 11/28/2023] [Accepted: 12/06/2023] [Indexed: 04/01/2024] Open
Abstract
This study measured electroencephalographic activity in the alpha band, often associated with task difficulty, to physiologically validate self-reported effort ratings from older hearing-impaired listeners performing the Repeat-Recall Test (RRT)-an integrative multipart assessment of speech-in-noise performance, context use, and auditory working memory. Following a single-blind within-subjects design, 16 older listeners (mean age = 71 years, SD = 13, 9 female) with a moderate-to-severe degree of bilateral sensorineural hearing loss performed the RRT while wearing hearing aids at four fixed signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) of -5, 0, 5, and 10 dB. Performance and subjective ratings of listening effort were assessed for complementary versions of the RRT materials with high/low availability of semantic context. Listeners were also tested with a version of the RRT that omitted the memory (i.e., recall) component. As expected, results showed alpha power to decrease significantly with increasing SNR from 0 through 10 dB. When tested with high context sentences, alpha was significantly higher in conditions where listeners had to recall the sentence materials compared to conditions where the recall requirement was omitted. When tested with low context sentences, alpha power was relatively high irrespective of the memory component. Within-subjects, alpha power was related to listening effort ratings collected across the different RRT conditions. Overall, these results suggest that the multipart demands of the RRT modulate both neural and behavioral measures of listening effort in directions consistent with the expected/designed difficulty of the RRT conditions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christopher Slugocki
- Office of Research in Clinical Amplification (ORCA-USA), WS Audiology, Lisle, IL, USA
| | - Francis Kuk
- Office of Research in Clinical Amplification (ORCA-USA), WS Audiology, Lisle, IL, USA
| | - Petri Korhonen
- Office of Research in Clinical Amplification (ORCA-USA), WS Audiology, Lisle, IL, USA
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6
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Viswanathan V, Bharadwaj HM, Heinz MG, Shinn-Cunningham BG. Induced alpha and beta electroencephalographic rhythms covary with single-trial speech intelligibility in competition. Sci Rep 2023; 13:10216. [PMID: 37353552 PMCID: PMC10290148 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-37173-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/06/2023] [Accepted: 06/17/2023] [Indexed: 06/25/2023] Open
Abstract
Neurophysiological studies suggest that intrinsic brain oscillations influence sensory processing, especially of rhythmic stimuli like speech. Prior work suggests that brain rhythms may mediate perceptual grouping and selective attention to speech amidst competing sound, as well as more linguistic aspects of speech processing like predictive coding. However, we know of no prior studies that have directly tested, at the single-trial level, whether brain oscillations relate to speech-in-noise outcomes. Here, we combined electroencephalography while simultaneously measuring intelligibility of spoken sentences amidst two different interfering sounds: multi-talker babble or speech-shaped noise. We find that induced parieto-occipital alpha (7-15 Hz; thought to modulate attentional focus) and frontal beta (13-30 Hz; associated with maintenance of the current sensorimotor state and predictive coding) oscillations covary with trial-wise percent-correct scores; importantly, alpha and beta power provide significant independent contributions to predicting single-trial behavioral outcomes. These results can inform models of speech processing and guide noninvasive measures to index different neural processes that together support complex listening.
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Affiliation(s)
- Vibha Viswanathan
- Neuroscience Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, 15213, USA.
| | - Hari M Bharadwaj
- Department of Communication Science and Disorders, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, 15260, USA
| | - Michael G Heinz
- Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA
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Lai J, Alain C, Bidelman GM. Cortical-brainstem interplay during speech perception in older adults with and without hearing loss. Front Neurosci 2023; 17:1075368. [PMID: 36816123 PMCID: PMC9932544 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2023.1075368] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/20/2022] [Accepted: 01/17/2023] [Indexed: 02/05/2023] Open
Abstract
Introduction Real time modulation of brainstem frequency-following responses (FFRs) by online changes in cortical arousal state via the corticofugal (top-down) pathway has been demonstrated previously in young adults and is more prominent in the presence of background noise. FFRs during high cortical arousal states also have a stronger relationship with speech perception. Aging is associated with increased auditory brain responses, which might reflect degraded inhibitory processing within the peripheral and ascending pathways, or changes in attentional control regulation via descending auditory pathways. Here, we tested the hypothesis that online corticofugal interplay is impacted by age-related hearing loss. Methods We measured EEG in older adults with normal-hearing (NH) and mild to moderate hearing-loss (HL) while they performed speech identification tasks in different noise backgrounds. We measured α power to index online cortical arousal states during task engagement. Subsequently, we split brainstem speech-FFRs, on a trial-by-trial basis, according to fluctuations in concomitant cortical α power into low or high α FFRs to index cortical-brainstem modulation. Results We found cortical α power was smaller in the HL than the NH group. In NH listeners, α-FFRs modulation for clear speech (i.e., without noise) also resembled that previously observed in younger adults for speech in noise. Cortical-brainstem modulation was further diminished in HL older adults in the clear condition and by noise in NH older adults. Machine learning classification showed low α FFR frequency spectra yielded higher accuracy for classifying listeners' perceptual performance in both NH and HL participants. Moreover, low α FFRs decreased with increased hearing thresholds at 0.5-2 kHz for clear speech but noise generally reduced low α FFRs in the HL group. Discussion Collectively, our study reveals cortical arousal state actively shapes brainstem speech representations and provides a potential new mechanism for older listeners' difficulties perceiving speech in cocktail party-like listening situations in the form of a miss-coordination between cortical and subcortical levels of auditory processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jesyin Lai
- Institute for Intelligent Systems, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, United States,School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, United States,Department of Diagnostic Imaging, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, United States
| | - Claude Alain
- Rotman Research Institute, Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care, Toronto, ON, Canada,Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Gavin M. Bidelman
- Institute for Intelligent Systems, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, United States,School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, United States,Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, United States,Program in Neuroscience, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, United States,*Correspondence: Gavin M. Bidelman,
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8
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Wang R, Liu Y, Shi J, Peng B, Fei W, Bi L. Sound Target Detection Under Noisy Environment Using Brain-Computer Interface. IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng 2023; 31:229-237. [PMID: 36331633 DOI: 10.1109/tnsre.2022.3219595] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/06/2022]
Abstract
As an important means of environmental reconnaissance and regional security protection, sound target detection (STD) has been widely studied in the field of machine learning for a long time. Considering the shortcomings of the robustness and generalization performance of existing methods based on machine learning, we proposed a target detection method by an auditory brain-computer interface (BCI). We designed the experimental paradigm according to the actual application scenarios of STD, recorded the changes in Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals during the process of detecting target sound, and further extracted the features used to decode EEG signals through the analysis of neural representations, including Event-Related Potential (ERP) and Event-Related Spectral Perturbation (ERSP). Experimental results showed that the proposed method achieved good detection performance under noisy environment. As the first study of BCI applied to STD, this study shows the feasibility of this scheme in BCI and can serve as the foundation for future related applications.
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Christensen J, Slavik L, Nicol JJ, Loehr JD. Alpha oscillations related to self-other integration and distinction during live orchestral performance: A naturalistic case study. PSYCHOLOGY OF MUSIC 2023; 51:295-315. [PMID: 36532616 PMCID: PMC9751440 DOI: 10.1177/03057356221091313] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/17/2023]
Abstract
Ensemble music performance requires musicians to achieve precise interpersonal coordination while maintaining autonomous control over their own actions. To do so, musicians dynamically shift between integrating other performers' actions into their own action plans and maintaining a distinction between their own and others' actions. Research in laboratory settings has shown that this dynamic process of self-other integration and distinction is indexed by sensorimotor alpha oscillations. The purpose of the current descriptive case study was to examine oscillations related to self-other integration and distinction in a naturalistic performance context. We measured alpha activity from four violinists during a concert hall performance of a 60-musician orchestra. We selected a musical piece from the orchestra's repertoire and, before analyzing alpha activity, performed a score analysis to divide the piece into sections that were expected to strongly promote self-other integration and distinction. In line with previous laboratory findings, performers showed suppressed and enhanced alpha activity during musical sections that promoted self-other integration and distinction, respectively. The current study thus provides preliminary evidence that findings from carefully controlled laboratory experiments generalize to complex real-world performance. Its findings also suggest directions for future research and potential applications of interest to musicians, music educators, and music therapists.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Lauren Slavik
- Department of Psychology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada
| | - Jennifer J Nicol
- Department of Educational Psychology and Special Education, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada
| | - Janeen D Loehr
- Department of Psychology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada
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Lanzilotti C, Andéol G, Micheyl C, Scannella S. Cocktail party training induces increased speech intelligibility and decreased cortical activity in bilateral inferior frontal gyri. A functional near-infrared study. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0277801. [PMID: 36454948 PMCID: PMC9714910 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0277801] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/28/2022] [Accepted: 11/03/2022] [Indexed: 12/03/2022] Open
Abstract
The human brain networks responsible for selectively listening to a voice amid other talkers remain to be clarified. The present study aimed to investigate relationships between cortical activity and performance in a speech-in-speech task, before (Experiment I) and after training-induced improvements (Experiment II). In Experiment I, 74 participants performed a speech-in-speech task while their cortical activity was measured using a functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) device. One target talker and one masker talker were simultaneously presented at three different target-to-masker ratios (TMRs): adverse, intermediate and favorable. Behavioral results show that performance may increase monotonically with TMR in some participants and failed to decrease, or even improved, in the adverse-TMR condition for others. On the neural level, an extensive brain network including the frontal (left prefrontal cortex, right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and bilateral inferior frontal gyri) and temporal (bilateral auditory cortex) regions was more solicited by the intermediate condition than the two others. Additionally, bilateral frontal gyri and left auditory cortex activities were found to be positively correlated with behavioral performance in the adverse-TMR condition. In Experiment II, 27 participants, whose performance was the poorest in the adverse-TMR condition of Experiment I, were trained to improve performance in that condition. Results show significant performance improvements along with decreased activity in bilateral inferior frontal gyri, the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the left inferior parietal cortex and the right auditory cortex in the adverse-TMR condition after training. Arguably, lower neural activity reflects higher efficiency in processing masker inhibition after speech-in-speech training. As speech-in-noise tasks also imply frontal and temporal regions, we suggest that regardless of the type of masking (speech or noise) the complexity of the task will prompt the implication of a similar brain network. Furthermore, the initial significant cognitive recruitment will be reduced following a training leading to an economy of cognitive resources.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cosima Lanzilotti
- Département Neuroscience et Sciences Cognitives, Institut de Recherche Biomédicale des Armées, Brétigny sur Orge, France
- ISAE-SUPAERO, Université de Toulouse, Toulouse, France
- Thales SIX GTS France, Gennevilliers, France
| | - Guillaume Andéol
- Département Neuroscience et Sciences Cognitives, Institut de Recherche Biomédicale des Armées, Brétigny sur Orge, France
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Xiu B, Paul BT, Chen JM, Le TN, Lin VY, Dimitrijevic A. Neural responses to naturalistic audiovisual speech are related to listening demand in cochlear implant users. Front Hum Neurosci 2022; 16:1043499. [DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2022.1043499] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/13/2022] [Accepted: 10/21/2022] [Indexed: 11/09/2022] Open
Abstract
There is a weak relationship between clinical and self-reported speech perception outcomes in cochlear implant (CI) listeners. Such poor correspondence may be due to differences in clinical and “real-world” listening environments and stimuli. Speech in the real world is often accompanied by visual cues, background environmental noise, and is generally in a conversational context, all factors that could affect listening demand. Thus, our objectives were to determine if brain responses to naturalistic speech could index speech perception and listening demand in CI users. Accordingly, we recorded high-density electroencephalogram (EEG) while CI users listened/watched a naturalistic stimulus (i.e., the television show, “The Office”). We used continuous EEG to quantify “speech neural tracking” (i.e., TRFs, temporal response functions) to the show’s soundtrack and 8–12 Hz (alpha) brain rhythms commonly related to listening effort. Background noise at three different signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs), +5, +10, and +15 dB were presented to vary the difficulty of following the television show, mimicking a natural noisy environment. The task also included an audio-only (no video) condition. After each condition, participants subjectively rated listening demand and the degree of words and conversations they felt they understood. Fifteen CI users reported progressively higher degrees of listening demand and less words and conversation with increasing background noise. Listening demand and conversation understanding in the audio-only condition was comparable to that of the highest noise condition (+5 dB). Increasing background noise affected speech neural tracking at a group level, in addition to eliciting strong individual differences. Mixed effect modeling showed that listening demand and conversation understanding were correlated to early cortical speech tracking, such that high demand and low conversation understanding occurred with lower amplitude TRFs. In the high noise condition, greater listening demand was negatively correlated to parietal alpha power, where higher demand was related to lower alpha power. No significant correlations were observed between TRF/alpha and clinical speech perception scores. These results are similar to previous findings showing little relationship between clinical speech perception and quality-of-life in CI users. However, physiological responses to complex natural speech may provide an objective measure of aspects of quality-of-life measures like self-perceived listening demand.
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Gray R, Sarampalis A, Başkent D, Harding EE. Working-Memory, Alpha-Theta Oscillations and Musical Training in Older Age: Research Perspectives for Speech-on-speech Perception. Front Aging Neurosci 2022; 14:806439. [PMID: 35645774 PMCID: PMC9131017 DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2022.806439] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/31/2021] [Accepted: 03/24/2022] [Indexed: 12/18/2022] Open
Abstract
During the normal course of aging, perception of speech-on-speech or “cocktail party” speech and use of working memory (WM) abilities change. Musical training, which is a complex activity that integrates multiple sensory modalities and higher-order cognitive functions, reportedly benefits both WM performance and speech-on-speech perception in older adults. This mini-review explores the relationship between musical training, WM and speech-on-speech perception in older age (> 65 years) through the lens of the Ease of Language Understanding (ELU) model. Linking neural-oscillation literature associating speech-on-speech perception and WM with alpha-theta oscillatory activity, we propose that two stages of speech-on-speech processing in the ELU are underpinned by WM-related alpha-theta oscillatory activity, and that effects of musical training on speech-on-speech perception may be reflected in these frequency bands among older adults.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ryan Gray
- Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
- Research School of Behavioural and Cognitive Neurosciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
- Department of Psychology, Centre for Applied Behavioural Sciences, School of Social Sciences, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, United Kingdom
| | - Anastasios Sarampalis
- Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
- Research School of Behavioural and Cognitive Neurosciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
| | - Deniz Başkent
- Research School of Behavioural and Cognitive Neurosciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
- Department of Otorhinolaryngology, University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
| | - Eleanor E. Harding
- Research School of Behavioural and Cognitive Neurosciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
- Department of Otorhinolaryngology, University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
- *Correspondence: Eleanor E. Harding,
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Herbst SK, Obleser J, van Wassenhove V. Implicit Versus Explicit Timing-Separate or Shared Mechanisms? J Cogn Neurosci 2022; 34:1447-1466. [PMID: 35579985 DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_01866] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2022]
Abstract
Time implicitly shapes cognition, but time is also explicitly represented, for instance, in the form of durations. Parsimoniously, the brain could use the same mechanisms for implicit and explicit timing. Yet, the evidence has been equivocal, revealing both joint versus separate signatures of timing. Here, we directly compared implicit and explicit timing using magnetoencephalography, whose temporal resolution allows investigating the different stages of the timing processes. Implicit temporal predictability was induced in an auditory paradigm by a manipulation of the foreperiod. Participants received two consecutive task instructions: discriminate pitch (indirect measure of implicit timing) or duration (direct measure of explicit timing). The results show that the human brain efficiently extracts implicit temporal statistics of sensory environments, to enhance the behavioral and neural responses to auditory stimuli, but that those temporal predictions did not improve explicit timing. In both tasks, attentional orienting in time during predictive foreperiods was indexed by an increase in alpha power over visual and parietal areas. Furthermore, pretarget induced beta power in sensorimotor and parietal areas increased during implicit compared to explicit timing, in line with the suggested role for beta oscillations in temporal prediction. Interestingly, no distinct neural dynamics emerged when participants explicitly paid attention to time, compared to implicit timing. Our work thus indicates that implicit timing shapes the behavioral and sensory response in an automatic way and is reflected in oscillatory neural dynamics, whereas the translation of implicit temporal statistics to explicit durations remains somewhat inconclusive, possibly because of the more abstract nature of this task.
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14
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ElShafei HA, Orlemann C, Haegens S. The Impact of Eye Closure on Anticipatory α Activity in a Tactile Discrimination Task. eNeuro 2022; 9:ENEURO.0412-21.2021. [PMID: 34965926 PMCID: PMC8805195 DOI: 10.1523/eneuro.0412-21.2021] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/01/2021] [Revised: 11/25/2021] [Accepted: 12/01/2021] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
One of the very first observations made regarding α oscillations (8-14 Hz), is that they increase in power over posterior areas when awake participants close their eyes. Recent work, especially in the context of (spatial) attention, suggests that α activity reflects a mechanism of functional inhibition. However, it remains unclear how eye closure impacts anticipatory α modulation observed in attention paradigms, and how this affects subsequent behavioral performance. Here, we recorded magnetoencephalography (MEG) in 33 human participants performing a tactile discrimination task with their eyes open versus closed. We replicated the hallmarks of previous somatosensory spatial attention studies: α lateralization across the somatosensory cortices as well as α increase over posterior (visual) regions. Furthermore, we found that eye closure leads to (1) reduced task performance; (2) widespread increase in α power; and (3) reduced anticipatory visual α modulation (4) with no effect on somatosensory α lateralization. Regardless of whether participants had their eyes open or closed, increased visual α power and somatosensory α lateralization improved their performance. Thus, we provide evidence that eye closure does not alter the impact of anticipatory α modulations on behavioral performance. We propose there is an optimal visual α level for somatosensory task performance, which can be achieved through a combination of eye closure and top-down anticipatory attention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hesham A ElShafei
- Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University, Nijmegen 6525 EN, The Netherlands
| | - Corinne Orlemann
- Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University, Nijmegen 6525 EN, The Netherlands
| | - Saskia Haegens
- Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University, Nijmegen 6525 EN, The Netherlands
- Department of Psychiatry, Columbia University, New York, NY 10032
- Division of Systems Neuroscience, New York State Psychiatric Institute, New York, NY 10032
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15
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Decoding Object-Based Auditory Attention from Source-Reconstructed MEG Alpha Oscillations. J Neurosci 2021; 41:8603-8617. [PMID: 34429378 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0583-21.2021] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/19/2021] [Revised: 08/08/2021] [Accepted: 08/11/2021] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
How do we attend to relevant auditory information in complex naturalistic scenes? Much research has focused on detecting which information is attended, without regarding underlying top-down control mechanisms. Studies investigating attentional control generally manipulate and cue specific features in simple stimuli. However, in naturalistic scenes it is impossible to dissociate relevant from irrelevant information based on low-level features. Instead, the brain has to parse and select auditory objects of interest. The neural underpinnings of object-based auditory attention remain not well understood. Here we recorded MEG while 15 healthy human subjects (9 female) prepared for the repetition of an auditory object presented in one of two overlapping naturalistic auditory streams. The stream containing the repetition was prospectively cued with 70% validity. Crucially, this task could not be solved by attending low-level features, but only by processing the objects fully. We trained a linear classifier on the cortical distribution of source-reconstructed oscillatory activity to distinguish which auditory stream was attended. We could successfully classify the attended stream from alpha (8-14 Hz) activity in anticipation of repetition onset. Importantly, attention could only be classified from trials in which subjects subsequently detected the repetition, but not from miss trials. Behavioral relevance was further supported by a correlation between classification accuracy and detection performance. Decodability was not sustained throughout stimulus presentation, but peaked shortly before repetition onset, suggesting that attention acted transiently according to temporal expectations. We thus demonstrate anticipatory alpha oscillations to underlie top-down control of object-based auditory attention in complex naturalistic scenes.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT In everyday life, we often find ourselves bombarded with auditory information, from which we need to select what is relevant to our current goals. Previous research has highlighted how we attend to specific highly controlled aspects of the auditory input. Although invaluable, it is still unclear how this relates to attentional control in naturalistic auditory scenes. Here we used the high precision of magnetoencephalography in space and time to investigate the brain mechanisms underlying top-down control of object-based attention in ecologically valid sound scenes. We show that rhythmic activity in auditory association cortex at a frequency of ∼10 Hz (alpha waves) controls attention to currently relevant segments within the auditory scene and predicts whether these segments are subsequently detected.
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16
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Vecchio F, Alù F, Orticoni A, Miraglia F, Judica E, Cotelli M, Rossini PM. Performance prediction in a visuo-motor task: the contribution of EEG analysis. Cogn Neurodyn 2021; 16:297-308. [PMID: 35401869 PMCID: PMC8934791 DOI: 10.1007/s11571-021-09713-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/01/2021] [Revised: 08/02/2021] [Accepted: 09/02/2021] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Brain state in the time preceding the task affects motor performance at single trial level. Aim of the study was to investigate, through a single trial analysis of the Power Spectral Density (PSD) of the cortical sources of EEG rhythms, whether there are EEG markers, which can predict trial-by-trial the subject's performance as measured by the reaction time (RT). 20 healthy adult volunteers performed a specific visuomotor task while continuously recorded with a 64 electrodes EEG. For each single trial, the PSD of the cortical sources of EEG rhythms was obtained from EEG data to cortical current density time series in 12 regions of interest at Brodmann areas level. Results showed a statistically significant increase of posterior and limbic alpha 1 and of frontal beta 2 power, and a reduction of frontal and limbic delta and of temporal alpha 1 power, during triggering stimulus presentation for better performance, namely faster responses. At single trial level, correlation analyses between RTs and significant PSD, revealed positive correlations in frontal delta, temporal alpha 1, and limbic delta bands, and negative ones in frontal beta 2, parietal alpha 1, and occipital alpha 1 bands. Furthermore, the subject's faster responses have been found as correlated with the similarity between the PSD values in parietal and occipital alpha 1. Predicting individual's performance at single trial level, might be extremely useful in the clinical context, since it could allow to launch rehabilitative therapies in the most efficient brain state, avoiding useless interventions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fabrizio Vecchio
- Brain Connectivity Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience and Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Via Val Cannuta, 247, 00166 Rome, Italy
- eCampus University, Novedrate, Como, Italy
| | - Francesca Alù
- Brain Connectivity Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience and Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Via Val Cannuta, 247, 00166 Rome, Italy
| | - Alessandro Orticoni
- Brain Connectivity Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience and Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Via Val Cannuta, 247, 00166 Rome, Italy
| | - Francesca Miraglia
- Brain Connectivity Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience and Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Via Val Cannuta, 247, 00166 Rome, Italy
| | - Elda Judica
- Department of Neurorehabilitation Sciences, Casa Cura Policlinico, Milano, Italy
| | - Maria Cotelli
- Neuropsychology Unit, IRCCS Istituto Centro San Giovanni Di Dio Fatebenefratelli, Brescia, Italy
| | - Paolo Maria Rossini
- Brain Connectivity Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience and Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Via Val Cannuta, 247, 00166 Rome, Italy
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17
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Individual alpha peak frequency is slower in schizophrenia and related to deficits in visual perception and cognition. Sci Rep 2021; 11:17852. [PMID: 34497330 PMCID: PMC8426382 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-97303-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 30] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/04/2021] [Accepted: 08/24/2021] [Indexed: 12/02/2022] Open
Abstract
The brain at rest generates cycles of electrical activity that have been shown to be abnormal in people with schizophrenia. The alpha rhythm (~ 10 Hz) is the dominant resting state electrical cycle and each person has a propensity toward a particular frequency of oscillation for this rhythm. This individual alpha peak frequency (IAPF) is hypothesized to be central to visual perceptual processes and may have downstream influences on cognitive functions such as attention, working memory, or problem solving. In the current study we sought to determine whether IAPF was slower in schizophrenia, and whether lower IAPF predicted deficits in visual perception and cognition that are often observed in schizophrenia. Eyes-closed resting state EEG activity, visual attention, and global cognitive functioning were assessed in individuals with schizophrenia (N = 104) and a group of healthy controls (N = 101). Compared to controls, the schizophrenia group showed slower IAPF and was associated with poorer discrimination of visual targets and nontargets on a computerized attention task, as well as impaired global cognition measured using neuropsychological tests across groups. Notably, disruptions in visual attention fully mediated the relationship between IAPF and global cognition across groups. The current findings demonstrate that slower alpha oscillatory cycling accounts for global cognitive deficits in schizophrenia by way of impairments in perceptual discrimination measured during a visual attention task.
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18
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Paul BT, Chen J, Le T, Lin V, Dimitrijevic A. Cortical alpha oscillations in cochlear implant users reflect subjective listening effort during speech-in-noise perception. PLoS One 2021; 16:e0254162. [PMID: 34242290 PMCID: PMC8270138 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0254162] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/31/2020] [Accepted: 06/22/2021] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Listening to speech in noise is effortful for individuals with hearing loss, even if they have received a hearing prosthesis such as a hearing aid or cochlear implant (CI). At present, little is known about the neural functions that support listening effort. One form of neural activity that has been suggested to reflect listening effort is the power of 8-12 Hz (alpha) oscillations measured by electroencephalography (EEG). Alpha power in two cortical regions has been associated with effortful listening-left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), and parietal cortex-but these relationships have not been examined in the same listeners. Further, there are few studies available investigating neural correlates of effort in the individuals with cochlear implants. Here we tested 16 CI users in a novel effort-focused speech-in-noise listening paradigm, and confirm a relationship between alpha power and self-reported effort ratings in parietal regions, but not left IFG. The parietal relationship was not linear but quadratic, with alpha power comparatively lower when effort ratings were at the top and bottom of the effort scale, and higher when effort ratings were in the middle of the scale. Results are discussed in terms of cognitive systems that are engaged in difficult listening situations, and the implication for clinical translation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Brandon T. Paul
- Evaluative Clinical Sciences Platform, Sunnybrook Research Institute, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| | - Joseph Chen
- Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Faculty of Medicine, Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| | - Trung Le
- Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Faculty of Medicine, Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| | - Vincent Lin
- Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Faculty of Medicine, Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
| | - Andrew Dimitrijevic
- Evaluative Clinical Sciences Platform, Sunnybrook Research Institute, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- Faculty of Medicine, Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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19
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Chan HL, Low I, Chen LF, Chen YS, Chu IT, Hsieh JC. A novel beamformer-based imaging of phase-amplitude coupling (BIPAC) unveiling the inter-regional connectivity of emotional prosody processing in women with primary dysmenorrhea. J Neural Eng 2021; 18. [PMID: 33691295 DOI: 10.1088/1741-2552/abed83] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2020] [Accepted: 03/10/2021] [Indexed: 12/30/2022]
Abstract
Objective. Neural communication or the interactions of brain regions play a key role in the formation of functional neural networks. A type of neural communication can be measured in the form of phase-amplitude coupling (PAC), which is the coupling between the phase of low-frequency oscillations and the amplitude of high-frequency oscillations. This paper presents a beamformer-based imaging method, beamformer-based imaging of PAC (BIPAC), to quantify the strength of PAC between a seed region and other brain regions.Approach. A dipole is used to model the ensemble of neural activity within a group of nearby neurons and represents a mixture of multiple source components of cortical activity. From ensemble activity at each brain location, the source component with the strongest coupling to the seed activity is extracted, while unrelated components are suppressed to enhance the sensitivity of coupled-source estimation.Main results. In evaluations using simulation data sets, BIPAC proved advantageous with regard to estimation accuracy in source localization, orientation, and coupling strength. BIPAC was also applied to the analysis of magnetoencephalographic signals recorded from women with primary dysmenorrhea in an implicit emotional prosody experiment. In response to negative emotional prosody, auditory areas revealed strong PAC with the ventral auditory stream and occipitoparietal areas in the theta-gamma and alpha-gamma bands, which may respectively indicate the recruitment of auditory sensory memory and attention reorientation. Moreover, patients with more severe pain experience appeared to have stronger coupling between auditory areas and temporoparietal regions.Significance. Our findings indicate that the implicit processing of emotional prosody is altered by menstrual pain experience. The proposed BIPAC is feasible and applicable to imaging inter-regional connectivity based on cross-frequency coupling estimates. The experimental results also demonstrate that BIPAC is capable of revealing autonomous brain processing and neurodynamics, which are more subtle than active and attended task-driven processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hui-Ling Chan
- Department of Computer Science, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Hsinchu, Taiwan
| | - Intan Low
- Institute of Brain Science, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan.,Integrated Brain Research Unit, Department of Medical Research, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Li-Fen Chen
- Institute of Brain Science, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan.,Integrated Brain Research Unit, Department of Medical Research, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.,Institute of Biomedical Informatics, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Yong-Sheng Chen
- Department of Computer Science, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Hsinchu, Taiwan
| | - Ian-Ting Chu
- Institute of Brain Science, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan
| | - Jen-Chuen Hsieh
- Institute of Brain Science, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan.,Integrated Brain Research Unit, Department of Medical Research, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan
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20
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Schneider D, Herbst SK, Klatt LI, Wöstmann M. Target enhancement or distractor suppression? Functionally distinct alpha oscillations form the basis of attention. Eur J Neurosci 2021; 55:3256-3265. [PMID: 33973310 DOI: 10.1111/ejn.15309] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/11/2020] [Revised: 04/07/2021] [Accepted: 05/04/2021] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Abstract
Recent advances in attention research have been propelled by the debate on target enhancement versus distractor suppression. A predominant neural correlate of attention is the modulation of alpha oscillatory power (~10 Hz), which signifies shifts of attention in time, space and between sensory modalities. However, the underspecified functional role of alpha oscillations limits the progress of tracking down the neurocognitive basis of attention. In this short opinion article, we review and critically examine a synthesis of three conceptual and methodological aspects that are indispensable for a mechanistic understanding of the role of alpha oscillations for attention. (a) Precise mapping of the anatomical source and the temporal response profile of neural signals reveals distinct alpha oscillatory processes that implement facilitatory versus suppressive components of attention. (b) A testable framework enables unanimous association of alpha modulation with either target enhancement or different forms of distractor suppression (active vs. automatic). (c) Linking anatomically specified alpha oscillations to behavior reveals the causal nature of alpha oscillations for attention. The three reviewed aspects substantially enrich study design, data analysis and interpretation of results to achieve the goal of understanding how anatomically specified and functionally relevant neural oscillations contribute to the implementation of facilitatory versus suppressive components of attention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Schneider
- Leibniz Research Centre for Working Environment and Human Factors, Dortmund, Germany
| | - Sophie K Herbst
- NeuroSpin, CEA, DRF/Joliot, INSERM, Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, Université Paris-Saclay, 91191Gif/Yvette, France
| | - Laura-Isabelle Klatt
- Leibniz Research Centre for Working Environment and Human Factors, Dortmund, Germany
| | - Malte Wöstmann
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany.,Center of Brain, Behavior and Metabolism (CBBM), University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
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21
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Delta/Theta band EEG activity shapes the rhythmic perceptual sampling of auditory scenes. Sci Rep 2021; 11:2370. [PMID: 33504860 PMCID: PMC7840678 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-82008-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2020] [Accepted: 01/13/2021] [Indexed: 11/08/2022] Open
Abstract
Many studies speak in favor of a rhythmic mode of listening, by which the encoding of acoustic information is structured by rhythmic neural processes at the time scale of about 1 to 4 Hz. Indeed, psychophysical data suggest that humans sample acoustic information in extended soundscapes not uniformly, but weigh the evidence at different moments for their perceptual decision at the time scale of about 2 Hz. We here test the critical prediction that such rhythmic perceptual sampling is directly related to the state of ongoing brain activity prior to the stimulus. Human participants judged the direction of frequency sweeps in 1.2 s long soundscapes while their EEG was recorded. We computed the perceptual weights attributed to different epochs within these soundscapes contingent on the phase or power of pre-stimulus EEG activity. This revealed a direct link between 4 Hz EEG phase and power prior to the stimulus and the phase of the rhythmic component of these perceptual weights. Hence, the temporal pattern by which the acoustic information is sampled over time for behavior is directly related to pre-stimulus brain activity in the delta/theta band. These results close a gap in the mechanistic picture linking ongoing delta band activity with their role in shaping the segmentation and perceptual influence of subsequent acoustic information.
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22
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Michaelis K, Miyakoshi M, Norato G, Medvedev AV, Turkeltaub PE. Motor engagement relates to accurate perception of phonemes and audiovisual words, but not auditory words. Commun Biol 2021; 4:108. [PMID: 33495548 PMCID: PMC7835217 DOI: 10.1038/s42003-020-01634-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/12/2020] [Accepted: 12/15/2020] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
A longstanding debate has surrounded the role of the motor system in speech perception, but progress in this area has been limited by tasks that only examine isolated syllables and conflate decision-making with perception. Using an adaptive task that temporally isolates perception from decision-making, we examined an EEG signature of motor activity (sensorimotor μ/beta suppression) during the perception of auditory phonemes, auditory words, audiovisual words, and environmental sounds while holding difficulty constant at two levels (Easy/Hard). Results revealed left-lateralized sensorimotor μ/beta suppression that was related to perception of speech but not environmental sounds. Audiovisual word and phoneme stimuli showed enhanced left sensorimotor μ/beta suppression for correct relative to incorrect trials, while auditory word stimuli showed enhanced suppression for incorrect trials. Our results demonstrate that motor involvement in perception is left-lateralized, is specific to speech stimuli, and it not simply the result of domain-general processes. These results provide evidence for an interactive network for speech perception in which dorsal stream motor areas are dynamically engaged during the perception of speech depending on the characteristics of the speech signal. Crucially, this motor engagement has different effects on the perceptual outcome depending on the lexicality and modality of the speech stimulus. Michaelis et al. used extra-cranial EEG during a forced-choice identification task to investigate the role of the motor system in speech perception. Their findings suggest that left hemisphere dorsal stream motor areas are dynamically engaged during speech perception based on the properties of the stimulus.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kelly Michaelis
- Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington, DC, USA.,Human Cortical Physiology and Stroke Neurorehabilitation Section, National Institute for Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Makoto Miyakoshi
- Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience, Institute for Neural Computation, University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA
| | - Gina Norato
- Clinical Trials Unit, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Andrei V Medvedev
- Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington, DC, USA
| | - Peter E Turkeltaub
- Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington, DC, USA. .,Research Division, Medstar National Rehabilitation Hospital, Washington, DC, USA.
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23
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Wöstmann M, Maess B, Obleser J. Orienting auditory attention in time: Lateralized alpha power reflects spatio-temporal filtering. Neuroimage 2020; 228:117711. [PMID: 33385562 PMCID: PMC7903158 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.117711] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/15/2020] [Revised: 11/27/2020] [Accepted: 12/21/2020] [Indexed: 12/30/2022] Open
Abstract
The deployment of neural alpha (8–12 Hz) lateralization in service of spatial attention is well-established: Alpha power increases in the cortical hemisphere ipsilateral to the attended hemifield, and decreases in the contralateral hemisphere, respectively. Much less is known about humans’ ability to deploy such alpha lateralization in time, and to thus exploit alpha power as a spatio-temporal filter. Here we show that spatially lateralized alpha power does signify – beyond the direction of spatial attention – the distribution of attention in time and thereby qualifies as a spatio-temporal attentional filter. Participants (N = 20) selectively listened to spoken numbers presented on one side (left vs right), while competing numbers were presented on the other side. Key to our hypothesis, temporal foreknowledge was manipulated via a visual cue, which was either instructive and indicated the to-be-probed number position (70% valid) or neutral. Temporal foreknowledge did guide participants’ attention, as they recognized numbers from the to-be-attended side more accurately following valid cues. In the magnetoencephalogram (MEG), spatial attention to the left versus right side induced lateralization of alpha power in all temporal cueing conditions. Modulation of alpha lateralization at the 0.8 Hz presentation rate of spoken numbers was stronger following instructive compared to neutral temporal cues. Critically, we found stronger modulation of lateralized alpha power specifically at the onsets of temporally cued numbers. These results suggest that the precisely timed hemispheric lateralization of alpha power qualifies as a spatio-temporal attentional filter mechanism susceptible to top-down behavioural goals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Malte Wöstmann
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Germany; Center of Brain, Behavior and Metabolism (CBBM), University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany.
| | - Burkhard Maess
- Max-Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Jonas Obleser
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Germany; Center of Brain, Behavior and Metabolism (CBBM), University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
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24
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Eqlimi E, Bockstael A, De Coensel B, Schönwiesner M, Talsma D, Botteldooren D. EEG Correlates of Learning From Speech Presented in Environmental Noise. Front Psychol 2020; 11:1850. [PMID: 33250798 PMCID: PMC7676901 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01850] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/13/2020] [Accepted: 07/06/2020] [Indexed: 01/07/2023] Open
Abstract
How the human brain retains relevant vocal information while suppressing irrelevant sounds is one of the ongoing challenges in cognitive neuroscience. Knowledge of the underlying mechanisms of this ability can be used to identify whether a person is distracted during listening to a target speech, especially in a learning context. This paper investigates the neural correlates of learning from the speech presented in a noisy environment using an ecologically valid learning context and electroencephalography (EEG). To this end, the following listening tasks were performed while 64-channel EEG signals were recorded: (1) attentive listening to the lectures in background sound, (2) attentive listening to the background sound presented alone, and (3) inattentive listening to the background sound. For the first task, 13 lectures of 5 min in length embedded in different types of realistic background noise were presented to participants who were asked to focus on the lectures. As background noise, multi-talker babble, continuous highway, and fluctuating traffic sounds were used. After the second task, a written exam was taken to quantify the amount of information that participants have acquired and retained from the lectures. In addition to various power spectrum-based EEG features in different frequency bands, the peak frequency and long-range temporal correlations (LRTC) of alpha-band activity were estimated. To reduce these dimensions, a principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to the different listening conditions resulting in the feature combinations that discriminate most between listening conditions and persons. Linear mixed-effect modeling was used to explain the origin of extracted principal components, showing their dependence on listening condition and type of background sound. Following this unsupervised step, a supervised analysis was performed to explain the link between the exam results and the EEG principal component scores using both linear fixed and mixed-effect modeling. Results suggest that the ability to learn from the speech presented in environmental noise can be predicted by the several components over the specific brain regions better than by knowing the background noise type. These components were linked to deterioration in attention, speech envelope following, decreased focusing during listening, cognitive prediction error, and specific inhibition mechanisms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ehsan Eqlimi
- WAVES Research Group, Department of Information Technology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
| | - Annelies Bockstael
- WAVES Research Group, Department of Information Technology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.,École d'Orthophonie et d'Audiologie, Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada.,Erasmushogeschool Brussel, Brussels, Belgium
| | - Bert De Coensel
- WAVES Research Group, Department of Information Technology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.,ASAsense, Bruges, Belgium
| | - Marc Schönwiesner
- Faculty of Biosciences, Pharmacy and Psychology, Institute of Biology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany.,International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada
| | - Durk Talsma
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
| | - Dick Botteldooren
- WAVES Research Group, Department of Information Technology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
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25
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Winneke AH, Schulte M, Vormann M, Latzel M. Effect of Directional Microphone Technology in Hearing Aids on Neural Correlates of Listening and Memory Effort: An Electroencephalographic Study. Trends Hear 2020; 24:2331216520948410. [PMID: 32833586 PMCID: PMC7448147 DOI: 10.1177/2331216520948410] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/02/2022] Open
Abstract
The aim of the study was to compare the effect of different spatial noise-processing algorithms in hearing aids on listening effort and memory effort on a subjective, behavioral, and neurophysiological level using electroencephalography (EEG). Two types of directional microphone (DM) technologies for spatial noise processing were chosen: one with a wide directionality (wide DM) and another with a narrower directionality (narrow DM) to accentuate the speech source. Participants with a severe hearing loss were fitted with hearing aids and participated in two EEG experiments. In the first one, participants listened to sentences in cafeteria noise and were asked to rate the experienced listening effort. The second EEG experiment was a listening span task during which participants had to repeat sentence material and then recall the final words of the last four sentences. Subjective listening effort was lower with narrow than wide DM and EEG alpha power was reduced for the narrow DM. The results of the listening span task indicated a reduction in experienced memory effort and better memory performance. During the memory retention phase, EEG alpha level for the narrow relative to the wide DM was reduced. This effect was more pronounced during linguistically difficult sentences. This study extends previous findings, as it reveals a benefit for narrow DM in terms of cognitive performance and memory effort also on a neural level, and when speech intelligibility is almost 100%. Together, this indicates that a narrow and focused DM allows for a more efficient neurocognitive processing than a wide DM.
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Affiliation(s)
- Axel H Winneke
- Fraunhofer-Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT, Project Group Hearing-, Speech-, and Audio Technology, Oldenburg, Germany
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Bice K, Yamasaki BL, Prat CS. Bilingual Language Experience Shapes Resting-State Brain Rhythms. NEUROBIOLOGY OF LANGUAGE (CAMBRIDGE, MASS.) 2020; 1:288-318. [PMID: 37215228 PMCID: PMC10158654 DOI: 10.1162/nol_a_00014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/26/2019] [Accepted: 04/27/2020] [Indexed: 05/24/2023]
Abstract
An increasing body of research has investigated how bilingual language experience changes brain structure and function, including changes to task-free, or "resting-state" brain connectivity. Such findings provide important evidence about how the brain continues to be shaped by different language experiences throughout the lifespan. The neural effects of bilingual language experience can provide evidence about the additional processing demands placed on the linguistic and/or executive systems by dual-language use. While considerable research has used MRI to examine where these changes occur, such methods cannot reveal the temporal dynamics of functioning brain networks at rest. The current study used data from task-free EEGS to disentangle how the linguistic and cognitive demands of bilingual language use impact brain functioning. Data analyzed from 106 bilinguals and 91 monolinguals revealed that bilinguals had greater alpha power, and significantly greater and broader coherence in the alpha and beta frequency ranges than monolinguals. Follow-up analyses showed that higher alpha was related to language control: more second-language use, higher native-language proficiency, and earlier age of second-language acquisition. Bilateral beta power was related to native-language proficiency, whereas theta was related to native-language proficiency only in left-hemisphere electrodes. The results contribute to our understanding of how the linguistic and cognitive requirements of dual-language use shape intrinsic brain activity, and what the broader implications for information processing may be.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Brianna L. Yamasaki
- Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences and Department of Psychology, University of Washington
- Department of Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University
| | - Chantel S. Prat
- Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences and Department of Psychology, University of Washington
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27
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Sorati M, Behne DM. Audiovisual Modulation in Music Perception for Musicians and Non-musicians. Front Psychol 2020; 11:1094. [PMID: 32547458 PMCID: PMC7273518 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01094] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/11/2020] [Accepted: 04/29/2020] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
In audiovisual music perception, visual information from a musical instrument being played is available prior to the onset of the corresponding musical sound and consequently allows a perceiver to form a prediction about the upcoming audio music. This prediction in audiovisual music perception, compared to auditory music perception, leads to lower N1 and P2 amplitudes and latencies. Although previous research suggests that audiovisual experience, such as previous musical experience may enhance this prediction, a remaining question is to what extent musical experience modifies N1 and P2 amplitudes and latencies. Furthermore, corresponding event-related phase modulations quantified as inter-trial phase coherence (ITPC) have not previously been reported for audiovisual music perception. In the current study, audio video recordings of a keyboard key being played were presented to musicians and non-musicians in audio only (AO), video only (VO), and audiovisual (AV) conditions. With predictive movements from playing the keyboard isolated from AV music perception (AV-VO), the current findings demonstrated that, compared to the AO condition, both groups had a similar decrease in N1 amplitude and latency, and P2 amplitude, along with correspondingly lower ITPC values in the delta, theta, and alpha frequency bands. However, while musicians showed lower ITPC values in the beta-band in AV-VO compared to the AO, non-musicians did not show this pattern. Findings indicate that AV perception may be broadly correlated with auditory perception, and differences between musicians and non-musicians further indicate musical experience to be a specific factor influencing AV perception. Predicting an upcoming sound in AV music perception may involve visual predictory processes, as well as beta-band oscillations, which may be influenced by years of musical training. This study highlights possible interconnectivity in AV perception as well as potential modulation with experience.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marzieh Sorati
- Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway
| | - Dawn Marie Behne
- Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway
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28
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Mamashli F, Huang S, Khan S, Hämäläinen MS, Ahlfors SP, Ahveninen J. Distinct Regional Oscillatory Connectivity Patterns During Auditory Target and Novelty Processing. Brain Topogr 2020; 33:477-488. [PMID: 32441009 DOI: 10.1007/s10548-020-00776-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/08/2019] [Accepted: 05/12/2020] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
Auditory attention allows us to focus on relevant target sounds in the acoustic environment while maintaining the capability to orient to unpredictable (novel) sound changes. An open question is whether orienting to expected vs. unexpected auditory events are governed by anatomically distinct attention pathways, respectively, or by differing communication patterns within a common system. To address this question, we applied a recently developed PeSCAR analysis method to evaluate spectrotemporal functional connectivity patterns across subregions of broader cortical regions of interest (ROIs) to analyze magnetoencephalography data obtained during a cued auditory attention task. Subjects were instructed to detect a predictable harmonic target sound embedded among standard tones in one ear and to ignore the standard tones and occasional unpredictable novel sounds presented in the opposite ear. Phase coherence of estimated source activity was calculated between subregions of superior temporal, frontal, inferior parietal, and superior parietal cortex ROIs. Functional connectivity was stronger in response to target than novel stimuli between left superior temporal and left parietal ROIs and between left frontal and right parietal ROIs, with the largest effects observed in the beta band (15-35 Hz). In contrast, functional connectivity was stronger in response to novel than target stimuli in inter-hemispheric connections between left and right frontal ROIs, observed in early time windows in the alpha band (8-12 Hz). Our findings suggest that auditory processing of expected target vs. unexpected novel sounds involves different spatially, temporally, and spectrally distributed oscillatory connectivity patterns across temporal, parietal, and frontal areas.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fahimeh Mamashli
- Department of Radiology, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, 02129, USA.
| | - Samantha Huang
- Department of Radiology, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, 02129, USA
| | - Sheraz Khan
- Department of Radiology, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, 02129, USA
| | - Matti S Hämäläinen
- Department of Radiology, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, 02129, USA
| | - Seppo P Ahlfors
- Department of Radiology, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, 02129, USA
| | - Jyrki Ahveninen
- Department of Radiology, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, 02129, USA
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29
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Weisz N, Kraft NG, Demarchi G. Auditory cortical alpha/beta desynchronization prioritizes the representation of memory items during a retention period. eLife 2020; 9:55508. [PMID: 32378513 PMCID: PMC7242024 DOI: 10.7554/elife.55508] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/27/2020] [Accepted: 05/05/2020] [Indexed: 12/11/2022] Open
Abstract
To-be-memorized information in working-memory could be protected against distracting influences by processes of functional inhibition or prioritization. Modulations of oscillations in the alpha to beta range in task-relevant sensory regions have been suggested to play an important role for both mechanisms. We adapted a Sternberg task variant to the auditory modality, with a strong or a weak distracting sound presented at a predictable time during the retention period. Using a time-generalized decoding approach, relatively decreased strength of memorized information was found prior to strong distractors, paralleled by decreased pre-distractor alpha/beta power in the left superior temporal gyrus (lSTG). Over the entire group, reduced beta power in lSTG was associated with relatively increased strength of memorized information. The extent of alpha power modulations within participants was negatively correlated with strength of memorized information. Overall, our results are compatible with a prioritization account, but point to nuanced differences between alpha and beta oscillations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nathan Weisz
- Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience and Department of Psychology, Paris-Lodron Universität Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria
| | - Nadine Gabriele Kraft
- Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience and Department of Psychology, Paris-Lodron Universität Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria
| | - Gianpaolo Demarchi
- Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience and Department of Psychology, Paris-Lodron Universität Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria
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30
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Abstract
Natural sounds contain acoustic dynamics ranging from tens to hundreds of milliseconds. How does the human auditory system encode acoustic information over wide-ranging timescales to achieve sound recognition? Previous work (Teng et al. 2017) demonstrated a temporal coding preference for the theta and gamma ranges, but it remains unclear how acoustic dynamics between these two ranges are coded. Here, we generated artificial sounds with temporal structures over timescales from ~200 to ~30 ms and investigated temporal coding on different timescales. Participants discriminated sounds with temporal structures at different timescales while undergoing magnetoencephalography recording. Although considerable intertrial phase coherence can be induced by acoustic dynamics of all the timescales, classification analyses reveal that the acoustic information of all timescales is preferentially differentiated through the theta and gamma bands, but not through the alpha and beta bands; stimulus reconstruction shows that the acoustic dynamics in the theta and gamma ranges are preferentially coded. We demonstrate that the theta and gamma bands show the generality of temporal coding with comparable capacity. Our findings provide a novel perspective-acoustic information of all timescales is discretised into two discrete temporal chunks for further perceptual analysis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiangbin Teng
- Department of Neuroscience, Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, 60322 Frankfurt, Germany
| | - David Poeppel
- Department of Neuroscience, Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, 60322 Frankfurt, Germany
- Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, NY 10003, USA
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31
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Fu D, Weber C, Yang G, Kerzel M, Nan W, Barros P, Wu H, Liu X, Wermter S. What Can Computational Models Learn From Human Selective Attention? A Review From an Audiovisual Unimodal and Crossmodal Perspective. Front Integr Neurosci 2020; 14:10. [PMID: 32174816 PMCID: PMC7056875 DOI: 10.3389/fnint.2020.00010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/03/2019] [Accepted: 02/11/2020] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Selective attention plays an essential role in information acquisition and utilization from the environment. In the past 50 years, research on selective attention has been a central topic in cognitive science. Compared with unimodal studies, crossmodal studies are more complex but necessary to solve real-world challenges in both human experiments and computational modeling. Although an increasing number of findings on crossmodal selective attention have shed light on humans' behavioral patterns and neural underpinnings, a much better understanding is still necessary to yield the same benefit for intelligent computational agents. This article reviews studies of selective attention in unimodal visual and auditory and crossmodal audiovisual setups from the multidisciplinary perspectives of psychology and cognitive neuroscience, and evaluates different ways to simulate analogous mechanisms in computational models and robotics. We discuss the gaps between these fields in this interdisciplinary review and provide insights about how to use psychological findings and theories in artificial intelligence from different perspectives.
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Affiliation(s)
- Di Fu
- CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China
- Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- Department of Informatics, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Cornelius Weber
- Department of Informatics, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Guochun Yang
- CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China
- Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Matthias Kerzel
- Department of Informatics, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Weizhi Nan
- Department of Psychology, Center for Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Education, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Pablo Barros
- Department of Informatics, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Haiyan Wu
- CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China
- Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Xun Liu
- CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Beijing, China
- Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Stefan Wermter
- Department of Informatics, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
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32
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Wöstmann M, Schmitt LM, Obleser J. Does Closing the Eyes Enhance Auditory Attention? Eye Closure Increases Attentional Alpha-Power Modulation but Not Listening Performance. J Cogn Neurosci 2020; 32:212-225. [DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_01403] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/23/2022]
Abstract
Abstract
In challenging listening conditions, closing the eyes is a strategy with intuitive appeal to improve auditory attention and perception. On the neural level, closing the eyes increases the power of alpha oscillations (∼10 Hz), which are a prime signature of auditory attention. Here, we test whether eye closure benefits neural and behavioral signatures of auditory attention and perception. Participants (n = 22) attended to one of two alternating streams of spoken numbers with open or closed eyes in a darkened chamber. After each trial, participants indicated whether probes had been among the to-be-attended or to-be-ignored numbers. In the EEG, states of relative high versus low alpha power accompanied the presentation of attended versus ignored numbers. Importantly, eye closure did not only increase the overall level of absolute alpha power but also the attentional modulation thereof. Behaviorally, however, neither perceptual sensitivity nor response criterion was affected by eye closure. To further examine whether this behavioral null result would conceptually replicate in a simple auditory detection task, a follow-up experiment was conducted that required participants (n = 19) to detect a near-threshold target tone in noise. As in the main experiment, our results provide evidence for the absence of any difference in perceptual sensitivity and criterion for open versus closed eyes. In summary, we demonstrate here that the modulation of the human alpha rhythm by auditory attention is increased when participants close their eyes. However, our results speak against the widely held belief that eye closure per se improves listening behavior.
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33
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Deng Y, Reinhart RMG, Choi I, Shinn-Cunningham BG. Causal links between parietal alpha activity and spatial auditory attention. eLife 2019; 8:e51184. [PMID: 31782732 PMCID: PMC6904218 DOI: 10.7554/elife.51184] [Citation(s) in RCA: 40] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/19/2019] [Accepted: 11/28/2019] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Both visual and auditory spatial selective attention result in lateralized alpha (8-14 Hz) oscillatory power in parietal cortex: alpha increases in the hemisphere ipsilateral to attentional focus. Brain stimulation studies suggest a causal relationship between parietal alpha and suppression of the representation of contralateral visual space. However, there is no evidence that parietal alpha controls auditory spatial attention. Here, we performed high definition transcranial alternating current stimulation (HD-tACS) on human subjects performing an auditory task in which they directed attention based on either spatial or nonspatial features. Alpha (10 Hz) but not theta (6 Hz) HD-tACS of right parietal cortex interfered with attending left but not right auditory space. Parietal stimulation had no effect for nonspatial auditory attention. Moreover, performance in post-stimulation trials returned rapidly to baseline. These results demonstrate a causal, frequency-, hemispheric-, and task-specific effect of parietal alpha brain stimulation on top-down control of auditory spatial attention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yuqi Deng
- Biomedical EngineeringBoston UniversityBostonUnited States
| | | | - Inyong Choi
- Communication Sciences and DisordersUniversity of IowaIowa CityUnited States
| | - Barbara G Shinn-Cunningham
- Biomedical EngineeringBoston UniversityBostonUnited States
- Neuroscience InstituteCarnegie Mellon UniversityPittsburghUnited States
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34
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Sorati M, Behne DM. Musical Expertise Affects Audiovisual Speech Perception: Findings From Event-Related Potentials and Inter-trial Phase Coherence. Front Psychol 2019; 10:2562. [PMID: 31803107 PMCID: PMC6874039 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02562] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/09/2019] [Accepted: 10/29/2019] [Indexed: 12/03/2022] Open
Abstract
In audiovisual speech perception, visual information from a talker's face during mouth articulation is available before the onset of the corresponding audio speech, and thereby allows the perceiver to use visual information to predict the upcoming audio. This prediction from phonetically congruent visual information modulates audiovisual speech perception and leads to a decrease in N1 and P2 amplitudes and latencies compared to the perception of audio speech alone. Whether audiovisual experience, such as with musical training, influences this prediction is unclear, but if so, may explain some of the variations observed in previous research. The current study addresses whether audiovisual speech perception is affected by musical training, first assessing N1 and P2 event-related potentials (ERPs) and in addition, inter-trial phase coherence (ITPC). Musicians and non-musicians are presented the syllable, /ba/ in audio only (AO), video only (VO), and audiovisual (AV) conditions. With the predictory effect of mouth movement isolated from the AV speech (AV-VO), results showed that, compared to audio speech, both groups have a lower N1 latency and P2 amplitude and latency. Moreover, they also showed lower ITPCs in the delta, theta, and beta bands in audiovisual speech perception. However, musicians showed significant suppression of N1 amplitude and desynchronization in the alpha band in audiovisual speech, not present for non-musicians. Collectively, the current findings indicate that early sensory processing can be modified by musical experience, which in turn can explain some of the variations in previous AV speech perception research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marzieh Sorati
- Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway
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35
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Alpha Oscillations in the Human Brain Implement Distractor Suppression Independent of Target Selection. J Neurosci 2019; 39:9797-9805. [PMID: 31641052 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1954-19.2019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 50] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/12/2019] [Revised: 10/10/2019] [Accepted: 10/11/2019] [Indexed: 12/24/2022] Open
Abstract
In principle, selective attention is the net result of target selection and distractor suppression. The way in which both mechanisms are implemented neurally has remained contested. Neural oscillatory power in the alpha frequency band (∼10 Hz) has been implicated in the selection of to-be-attended targets, but there is lack of empirical evidence for its involvement in the suppression of to-be-ignored distractors. Here, we use electroencephalography recordings of N = 33 human participants (males and females) to test the preregistered hypothesis that alpha power directly relates to distractor suppression and thus operates independently from target selection. In an auditory spatial pitch discrimination task, we modulated the location (left vs right) of either a target or a distractor tone sequence, while fixing the other in the front. When the distractor was fixed in the front, alpha power relatively decreased contralaterally to the target and increased ipsilaterally. Most importantly, when the target was fixed in the front, alpha lateralization reversed in direction for the suppression of distractors on the left versus right. These data show that target-selection-independent alpha power modulation is involved in distractor suppression. Although both lateralized alpha responses for selection and for suppression proved reliable, they were uncorrelated and distractor-related alpha power emerged from more anterior, frontal cortical regions. Lending functional significance to suppression-related alpha oscillations, alpha lateralization at the individual, single-trial level was predictive of behavioral accuracy. These results fuel a renewed look at neurobiological accounts of selection-independent suppressive filtering in attention.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Although well established models of attention rest on the assumption that irrelevant sensory information is filtered out, the neural implementation of such a filter mechanism is unclear. Using an auditory attention task that decouples target selection from distractor suppression, we demonstrate that two sign-reversed lateralized alpha responses reflect target selection versus distractor suppression. Critically, these alpha responses are reliable, independent of each other, and generated in more anterior, frontal regions for suppression versus selection. Prediction of single-trial task performance from alpha modulation after stimulus onset agrees with the view that alpha modulation bears direct functional relevance as a neural implementation of attention. Results demonstrate that the neurobiological foundation of attention implies a selection-independent alpha oscillatory mechanism to suppress distraction.
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36
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Ruiz-Mejias M. Outer Brain Oscillations in Down Syndrome. Front Syst Neurosci 2019; 13:17. [PMID: 31139056 PMCID: PMC6519307 DOI: 10.3389/fnsys.2019.00017] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/07/2019] [Accepted: 04/12/2019] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The present article reviews the relationship between sleep and oscillatory activity in Down Syndrome (DS), as well as the featuring emergent rhythmic activity across different brain states. A comprehensive discussion of the data from electroencephalographic studies in DS humans and transgenic/trisomic mouse models is provided, as well as data from signals collected from local field potentials (LFP) and intracellular recordings in DS mouse models. The first sections focus specially on the alpha phenotype consistently observed in DS subjects, as well as its description in DS childhood and aging. Subsequently, a review of the data reported in DS mouse models is presented with the aim to deepen on the mechanisms underlying altered rhythmic patterns. Further sections situate the state-of-the-art of the field, with a discussion on the possible circuit alterations that may underlie impaired alpha and gamma oscillatory activity. A further aim is to highlight the importance of studying network oscillatory activity in mouse models to infer alterations in the underlying circuits related to cognition, such as in intellectual disability. In this direction, a view of alpha and gamma rhythms generated by the cerebral cortex as a tool for evaluating an unbalance between excitation and inhibition in DS is claimed, which points out toward an over-inhibited network. A final aim is to situate oscillatory activity as a key phenomenon that may be used as a biomarker for monitoring as well the effect of novel therapeutic strategies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marcel Ruiz-Mejias
- Systems Neuroscience, Institut d'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer, Barcelona, Spain
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37
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Neural Speech Tracking in the Theta and in the Delta Frequency Band Differentially Encode Clarity and Comprehension of Speech in Noise. J Neurosci 2019; 39:5750-5759. [PMID: 31109963 PMCID: PMC6636082 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1828-18.2019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 77] [Impact Index Per Article: 15.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/18/2018] [Revised: 05/01/2019] [Accepted: 05/11/2019] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Humans excel at understanding speech even in adverse conditions such as background noise. Speech processing may be aided by cortical activity in the delta and theta frequency bands, which have been found to track the speech envelope. However, the rhythm of non-speech sounds is tracked by cortical activity as well. It therefore remains unclear which aspects of neural speech tracking represent the processing of acoustic features, related to the clarity of speech, and which aspects reflect higher-level linguistic processing related to speech comprehension. Here we disambiguate the roles of cortical tracking for speech clarity and comprehension through recording EEG responses to native and foreign language in different levels of background noise, for which clarity and comprehension vary independently. We then use a both a decoding and an encoding approach to relate clarity and comprehension to the neural responses. We find that cortical tracking in the theta frequency band is mainly correlated to clarity, whereas the delta band contributes most to speech comprehension. Moreover, we uncover an early neural component in the delta band that informs on comprehension and that may reflect a predictive mechanism for language processing. Our results disentangle the functional contributions of cortical speech tracking in the delta and theta bands to speech processing. They also show that both speech clarity and comprehension can be accurately decoded from relatively short segments of EEG recordings, which may have applications in future mind-controlled auditory prosthesis. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Speech is a highly complex signal whose processing requires analysis from lower-level acoustic features to higher-level linguistic information. Recent work has shown that neural activity in the delta and theta frequency bands track the rhythm of speech, but the role of this tracking for speech processing remains unclear. Here we disentangle the roles of cortical entrainment in different frequency bands and at different temporal lags for speech clarity, reflecting the acoustics of the signal, and speech comprehension, related to linguistic processing. We show that cortical speech tracking in the theta frequency band encodes mostly speech clarity, and thus acoustic aspects of the signal, whereas speech tracking in the delta band encodes the higher-level speech comprehension.
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38
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Szalárdy O, Tóth B, Farkas D, György E, Winkler I. Neuronal Correlates of Informational and Energetic Masking in the Human Brain in a Multi-Talker Situation. Front Psychol 2019; 10:786. [PMID: 31024409 PMCID: PMC6465330 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00786] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/20/2018] [Accepted: 03/21/2019] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Human listeners can follow the voice of one speaker while several others are talking at the same time. This process requires segregating the speech streams from each other and continuously directing attention to the target stream. We investigated the functional brain networks underlying this ability. Two speech streams were presented simultaneously to participants, who followed one of them and detected targets within it (target stream). The loudness of the distractor speech stream varied on five levels: moderately softer, slightly softer, equal, slightly louder, or moderately louder than the attended. Performance measures showed that the most demanding task was the moderately softer distractors condition, which indicates that a softer distractor speech may receive more covert attention than louder distractors and, therefore, they require more cognitive resources. EEG-based measurement of functional connectivity between various brain regions revealed frequency-band specific networks: (1) energetic masking (comparing the louder distractor conditions with the equal loudness condition) was predominantly associated with stronger connectivity between the frontal and temporal regions at the lower alpha (8–10 Hz) and gamma (30–70 Hz) bands; (2) informational masking (comparing the softer distractor conditions with the equal loudness condition) was associated with a distributed network between parietal, frontal, and temporal regions at the theta (4–8 Hz) and beta (13–30 Hz) bands. These results suggest the presence of distinct cognitive and neural processes for solving the interference from energetic vs. informational masking.
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Affiliation(s)
- Orsolya Szalárdy
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary.,Institute of Behavioural Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Brigitta Tóth
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Dávid Farkas
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Erika György
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - István Winkler
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
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Tóth B, Farkas D, Urbán G, Szalárdy O, Orosz G, Hunyadi L, Hajdu B, Kovács A, Szabó BT, Shestopalova LB, Winkler I. Attention and speech-processing related functional brain networks activated in a multi-speaker environment. PLoS One 2019; 14:e0212754. [PMID: 30818389 PMCID: PMC6394951 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0212754] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/13/2018] [Accepted: 02/10/2019] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Human listeners can focus on one speech stream out of several concurrent ones. The present study aimed to assess the whole-brain functional networks underlying a) the process of focusing attention on a single speech stream vs. dividing attention between two streams and 2) speech processing on different time-scales and depth. Two spoken narratives were presented simultaneously while listeners were instructed to a) track and memorize the contents of a speech stream and b) detect the presence of numerals or syntactic violations in the same ("focused attended condition") or in the parallel stream ("divided attended condition"). Speech content tracking was found to be associated with stronger connectivity in lower frequency bands (delta band- 0,5-4 Hz), whereas the detection tasks were linked with networks operating in the faster alpha (8-10 Hz) and beta (13-30 Hz) bands. These results suggest that the oscillation frequencies of the dominant brain networks during speech processing may be related to the duration of the time window within which information is integrated. We also found that focusing attention on a single speaker compared to dividing attention between two concurrent speakers was predominantly associated with connections involving the frontal cortices in the delta (0.5-4 Hz), alpha (8-10 Hz), and beta bands (13-30 Hz), whereas dividing attention between two parallel speech streams was linked with stronger connectivity involving the parietal cortices in the delta and beta frequency bands. Overall, connections strengthened by focused attention may reflect control over information selection, whereas connections strengthened by divided attention may reflect the need for maintaining two streams in parallel and the related control processes necessary for performing the tasks.
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Affiliation(s)
- Brigitta Tóth
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Dávid Farkas
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Cognitive Science, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Gábor Urbán
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Cognitive Science, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Orsolya Szalárdy
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Institute of Behavioural Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Gábor Orosz
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Social and Educational Psychology, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
| | - László Hunyadi
- Department of General and Applied Linguistic, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, Hungary
| | - Botond Hajdu
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Annamária Kovács
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Telecommunication and Media Informatics, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Beáta Tünde Szabó
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Faculty of Information Technology and Bionics, Pázmány Péter Catholic University, Piliscsaba, Hungary
| | | | - István Winkler
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
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40
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McNair SW, Kayser SJ, Kayser C. Consistent pre-stimulus influences on auditory perception across the lifespan. Neuroimage 2019; 186:22-32. [PMID: 30391564 PMCID: PMC6347568 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2018.10.085] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/27/2018] [Revised: 10/29/2018] [Accepted: 10/31/2018] [Indexed: 01/29/2023] Open
Abstract
As we get older, perception in cluttered environments becomes increasingly difficult as a result of changes in peripheral and central neural processes. Given the aging society, it is important to understand the neural mechanisms constraining perception in the elderly. In young participants, the state of rhythmic brain activity prior to a stimulus has been shown to modulate the neural encoding and perceptual impact of this stimulus - yet it remains unclear whether, and if so, how, the perceptual relevance of pre-stimulus activity changes with age. Using the auditory system as a model, we recorded EEG activity during a frequency discrimination task from younger and older human listeners. By combining single-trial EEG decoding with linear modelling we demonstrate consistent statistical relations between pre-stimulus power and the encoding of sensory evidence in short-latency EEG components, and more variable relations between pre-stimulus phase and subjects' decisions in longer-latency components. At the same time, we observed a significant slowing of auditory evoked responses and a flattening of the overall EEG frequency spectrum in the older listeners. Our results point to mechanistically consistent relations between rhythmic brain activity and sensory encoding that emerge despite changes in neural response latencies and the relative amplitude of rhythmic brain activity with age.
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Affiliation(s)
- Steven W McNair
- Institute of Neuroscience and Psychology, University of Glasgow, 62 Hillhead Street, G12 8QB, United Kingdom
| | - Stephanie J Kayser
- Department for Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Biology, Bielefeld University, Universitätsstr. 25, 33615, Bielefeld, Germany; Cognitive Interaction Technology - Center of Excellence, Bielefeld University, Inspiration 1, 33615, Bielefeld, Germany
| | - Christoph Kayser
- Department for Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Biology, Bielefeld University, Universitätsstr. 25, 33615, Bielefeld, Germany; Cognitive Interaction Technology - Center of Excellence, Bielefeld University, Inspiration 1, 33615, Bielefeld, Germany.
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41
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Thornton D, Harkrider AW, Jenson DE, Saltuklaroglu T. Sex differences in early sensorimotor processing for speech discrimination. Sci Rep 2019; 9:392. [PMID: 30674942 PMCID: PMC6344575 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-36775-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/03/2018] [Accepted: 11/12/2018] [Indexed: 11/08/2022] Open
Abstract
Sensorimotor activity in speech perception tasks varies as a function of context, cognitive load, and cognitive ability. This study investigated listener sex as an additional variable. Raw EEG data were collected as 21 males and 21 females discriminated /ba/ and /da/ in quiet and noisy backgrounds. Independent component analyses of data from accurately discriminated trials identified sensorimotor mu components with characteristic alpha and beta peaks from 16 members of each sex. Time-frequency decompositions showed that in quiet discrimination, females displayed stronger early mu-alpha synchronization, whereas males showed stronger mu-beta desynchronization. Findings indicate that early attentional mechanisms for speech discrimination were characterized by sensorimotor inhibition in females and predictive sensorimotor activation in males. Both sexes showed stronger early sensorimotor inhibition in noisy discrimination conditions versus in quiet, suggesting sensory gating of the noise. However, the difference in neural activation between quiet and noisy conditions was greater in males than females. Though sex differences appear unrelated to behavioral accuracy, they suggest that males and females exhibit early sensorimotor processing for speech discrimination that is fundamentally different, yet similarly adaptable to adverse conditions. Findings have implications for understanding variability in neuroimaging data and the male prevalence in various neurodevelopmental disorders with inhibitory dysfunction.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Ashley W Harkrider
- University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA
| | - David E Jenson
- Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine, Washington State University, Spokane, WA, 99202, USA
| | - Tim Saltuklaroglu
- University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA
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42
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Temporal Expectation Modulates the Cortical Dynamics of Short-Term Memory. J Neurosci 2018; 38:7428-7439. [PMID: 30012685 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2928-17.2018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/11/2017] [Revised: 07/09/2018] [Accepted: 07/10/2018] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Increased memory load is often signified by enhanced neural oscillatory power in the alpha range (8-13 Hz), which is taken to reflect inhibition of task-irrelevant brain regions. The corresponding neural correlates of memory decay, however, are not yet well understood. In the current study, we investigated auditory short-term memory decay in humans using a delayed matching-to-sample task with pure-tone sequences. First, in a behavioral experiment, we modeled memory performance over six different delay-phase durations. Second, in a MEG experiment, we assessed alpha-power modulations over three different delay-phase durations. In both experiments, the temporal expectation for the to-be-remembered sound was manipulated so that it was either temporally expected or not. In both studies, memory performance declined over time, but this decline was weaker when the onset time of the to-be-remembered sound was expected. Similarly, patterns of alpha power in and alpha-tuned connectivity between sensory cortices changed parametrically with delay duration (i.e., decrease in occipitoparietal regions, increase in temporal regions). Temporal expectation not only counteracted alpha-power decline in heteromodal brain areas (i.e., supramarginal gyrus), but also had a beneficial effect on memory decay, counteracting memory performance decline. Correspondingly, temporal expectation also boosted alpha connectivity within attention networks known to play an active role during memory maintenance. The present data show how patterns of alpha power orchestrate short-term memory decay and encourage a more nuanced perspective on alpha power across brain space and time beyond its inhibitory role.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Our sensory memories of the physical world fade quickly. We show here that this decay of short-term memory can be counteracted by so-called temporal expectation; that is, knowledge of when to expect a sensory event that an individual must remember. We also show that neural oscillations in the "alpha" (8-13 Hz) range index both the degree of memory decay (for brief sound patterns) and the respective memory benefit from temporal expectation. Spatially distributed cortical patterns of alpha power show opposing effects in auditory versus visual sensory cortices. Moreover, alpha-tuned connectivity changes within supramodal attention networks reflect the allocation of neural resources as short-term memory representations fade.
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43
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Mehraei G, Shinn-Cunningham B, Dau T. Influence of talker discontinuity on cortical dynamics of auditory spatial attention. Neuroimage 2018; 179:548-556. [PMID: 29960089 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2018.06.067] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/05/2018] [Revised: 06/12/2018] [Accepted: 06/25/2018] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
In everyday acoustic scenes, listeners face the challenge of selectively attending to a sound source and maintaining attention on that source long enough to extract meaning. This task is made more daunting by frequent perceptual discontinuities in the acoustic scene: talkers move in space and conversations switch from one speaker to another in a background of many other sources. The inherent dynamics of such switches directly impact our ability to sustain attention. Here we asked how discontinuity in talker voice affects the ability to focus auditory attention to sounds from a particular location as well as neural correlates of underlying processes. During electroencephalography recordings, listeners attended to a stream of spoken syllables from one direction while ignoring distracting syllables from a different talker from the opposite hemifield. On some trials, the talker switched locations in the middle of the streams, creating a discontinuity. This switch disrupted attentional modulation of cortical responses; specifically, event-related potentials evoked by syllables in the to-be-attended direction were suppressed and power in alpha oscillations (8-12 Hz) were reduced following the discontinuity. Importantly, at an individual level, the ability to maintain attention to a target stream and report its content, despite the discontinuity, correlates with the magnitude of the disruption of these cortical responses. These results have implications for understanding cortical mechanisms supporting attention. The changes in the cortical responses may serve as a predictor of how well individuals can communicate in complex acoustic scenes and may help in the development of assistive devices and interventions to aid clinical populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Golbarg Mehraei
- Hearing Systems Group, Technical University of Denmark, Ørsteds Plads Building 352, 2800, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark.
| | - Barbara Shinn-Cunningham
- Center for Research in Sensory Communication and Emerging Neural Technology, Boston University, Boston, MA, 02215, USA; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University, Boston, MA, 02215, USA
| | - Torsten Dau
- Hearing Systems Group, Technical University of Denmark, Ørsteds Plads Building 352, 2800, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark
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44
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Milner R, Lewandowska M, Ganc M, Włodarczyk E, Grudzień D, Skarżyński H. Abnormal Resting-State Quantitative Electroencephalogram in Children With Central Auditory Processing Disorder: A Pilot Study. Front Neurosci 2018; 12:292. [PMID: 29867312 PMCID: PMC5958225 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2018.00292] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/22/2017] [Accepted: 04/13/2018] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
In this study, we showed an abnormal resting-state quantitative electroencephalogram (QEEG) pattern in children with central auditory processing disorder (CAPD). Twenty-seven children (16 male, 11 female; mean age = 10.7 years) with CAPD and no symptoms of other developmental disorders, as well as 23 age- and sex-matched, typically developing children (TDC, 11 male, 13 female; mean age = 11.8 years) underwent examination of central auditory processes (CAPs) and QEEG evaluation consisting of two randomly presented blocks of “Eyes Open” (EO) or “Eyes Closed” (EC) recordings. Significant correlations between individual frequency band powers and CAP tests performance were found. The QEEG studies revealed that in CAPD relative to TDC there was no effect of decreased delta absolute power (1.5–4 Hz) in EO compared to the EC condition. Furthermore, children with CAPD showed increased theta power (4–8 Hz) in the frontal area, a tendency toward elevated theta power in EO block, and reduced low-frequency beta power (12–15 Hz) in the bilateral occipital and the left temporo-occipital regions for both EO and EC conditions. Decreased middle-frequency beta power (15–18 Hz) in children with CAPD was observed only in the EC block. The findings of the present study suggest that QEEG could be an adequate tool to discriminate children with CAPD from normally developing children. Correlation analysis shows relationship between the individual EEG resting frequency bands and the CAPs. Increased power of slow waves and decreased power of fast rhythms could indicate abnormal functioning (hypoarousal of the cortex and/or an immaturity) of brain areas not specialized in auditory information processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rafał Milner
- Department of Experimental Audiology, World Hearing Center, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Monika Lewandowska
- Bioimaging Research Center, World Hearing Center, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland.,Faculty of Humanities, Nicolaus Copernicus University, Toruń, Poland
| | - Małgorzata Ganc
- Department of Experimental Audiology, World Hearing Center, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Elżbieta Włodarczyk
- Audiology and Phoniatrics Clinic, World Hearing Center, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Diana Grudzień
- Rehabilitation Clinic, World Hearing Center, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Henryk Skarżyński
- World Hearing Center, Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing, Warsaw, Poland
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45
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Tracking Temporal Hazard in the Human Electroencephalogram Using a Forward Encoding Model. eNeuro 2018; 5:eN-NWR-0017-18. [PMID: 29740594 PMCID: PMC5938715 DOI: 10.1523/eneuro.0017-18.2018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/10/2018] [Revised: 04/11/2018] [Accepted: 04/15/2018] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Human observers automatically extract temporal contingencies from the environment and predict the onset of future events. Temporal predictions are modeled by the hazard function, which describes the instantaneous probability for an event to occur given it has not occurred yet. Here, we tackle the question of whether and how the human brain tracks continuous temporal hazard on a moment-to-moment basis, and how flexibly it adjusts to strictly implicit variations in the hazard function. We applied an encoding-model approach to human electroencephalographic data recorded during a pitch-discrimination task, in which we implicitly manipulated temporal predictability of the target tones by varying the interval between cue and target tone (i.e. the foreperiod). Critically, temporal predictability either was driven solely by the passage of time (resulting in a monotonic hazard function) or was modulated to increase at intermediate foreperiods (resulting in a modulated hazard function with a peak at the intermediate foreperiod). Forward-encoding models trained to predict the recorded EEG signal from different temporal hazard functions were able to distinguish between experimental conditions, showing that implicit variations of temporal hazard bear tractable signatures in the human electroencephalogram. Notably, this tracking signal was reconstructed best from the supplementary motor area, underlining this area’s link to cognitive processing of time. Our results underline the relevance of temporal hazard to cognitive processing and show that the predictive accuracy of the encoding-model approach can be utilized to track abstract time-resolved stimuli.
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46
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Miles K, McMahon C, Boisvert I, Ibrahim R, de Lissa P, Graham P, Lyxell B. Objective Assessment of Listening Effort: Coregistration of Pupillometry and EEG. Trends Hear 2018; 21:2331216517706396. [PMID: 28752807 PMCID: PMC5536372 DOI: 10.1177/2331216517706396] [Citation(s) in RCA: 36] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/01/2023] Open
Abstract
Listening to speech in noise is effortful, particularly for people with hearing impairment. While it is known that effort is related to a complex interplay between bottom-up and top-down processes, the cognitive and neurophysiological mechanisms contributing to effortful listening remain unknown. Therefore, a reliable physiological measure to assess effort remains elusive. This study aimed to determine whether pupil dilation and alpha power change, two physiological measures suggested to index listening effort, assess similar processes. Listening effort was manipulated by parametrically varying spectral resolution (16- and 6-channel noise vocoding) and speech reception thresholds (SRT; 50% and 80%) while 19 young, normal-hearing adults performed a speech recognition task in noise. Results of off-line sentence scoring showed discrepancies between the target SRTs and the true performance obtained during the speech recognition task. For example, in the SRT80% condition, participants scored an average of 64.7%. Participants’ true performance levels were therefore used for subsequent statistical modelling. Results showed that both measures appeared to be sensitive to changes in spectral resolution (channel vocoding), while pupil dilation only was also significantly related to their true performance levels (%) and task accuracy (i.e., whether the response was correctly or partially recalled). The two measures were not correlated, suggesting they each may reflect different cognitive processes involved in listening effort. This combination of findings contributes to a growing body of research aiming to develop an objective measure of listening effort.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kelly Miles
- 1 Department of Linguistics, Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.,2 The HEARing Cooperative Research Centre, Melbourne, Australia.,3 Linnaeus Centre for HEaring And Deafness (HEAD), Swedish Institute for Disability Research, Linköping University, Sweden
| | - Catherine McMahon
- 1 Department of Linguistics, Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.,2 The HEARing Cooperative Research Centre, Melbourne, Australia
| | - Isabelle Boisvert
- 1 Department of Linguistics, Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.,2 The HEARing Cooperative Research Centre, Melbourne, Australia
| | - Ronny Ibrahim
- 1 Department of Linguistics, Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.,2 The HEARing Cooperative Research Centre, Melbourne, Australia
| | - Peter de Lissa
- 2 The HEARing Cooperative Research Centre, Melbourne, Australia.,4 Department of Psychology, Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia
| | - Petra Graham
- 5 Department of Statistics, Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia
| | - Björn Lyxell
- 3 Linnaeus Centre for HEaring And Deafness (HEAD), Swedish Institute for Disability Research, Linköping University, Sweden
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47
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Lim SJ, Wöstmann M, Geweke F, Obleser J. The Benefit of Attention-to-Memory Depends on the Interplay of Memory Capacity and Memory Load. Front Psychol 2018. [PMID: 29520246 PMCID: PMC5827549 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00184] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Humans can be cued to attend to an item in memory, which facilitates and enhances the perceptual precision in recalling this item. Here, we demonstrate that this facilitating effect of attention-to-memory hinges on the overall degree of memory load. The benefit an individual draws from attention-to-memory depends on her overall working memory performance, measured as sensitivity (d') in a retroactive cue (retro-cue) pitch discrimination task. While listeners maintained 2, 4, or 6 auditory syllables in memory, we provided valid or neutral retro-cues to direct listeners' attention to one, to-be-probed syllable in memory. Participants' overall memory performance (i.e., perceptual sensitivity d') was relatively unaffected by the presence of valid retro-cues across memory loads. However, a more fine-grained analysis using psychophysical modeling shows that valid retro-cues elicited faster pitch-change judgments and improved perceptual precision. Importantly, as memory load increased, listeners' overall working memory performance correlated with inter-individual differences in the degree to which precision improved (r = 0.39, p = 0.029). Under high load, individuals with low working memory profited least from attention-to-memory. Our results demonstrate that retrospective attention enhances perceptual precision of attended items in memory but listeners' optimal use of informative cues depends on their overall memory abilities.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sung-Joo Lim
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany.,Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Malte Wöstmann
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany.,Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Frederik Geweke
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Jonas Obleser
- Department of Psychology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany.,Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
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48
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Is Listening in Noise Worth It? The Neurobiology of Speech Recognition in Challenging Listening Conditions. Ear Hear 2018; 37 Suppl 1:101S-10S. [PMID: 27355759 DOI: 10.1097/aud.0000000000000300] [Citation(s) in RCA: 80] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
This review examines findings from functional neuroimaging studies of speech recognition in noise to provide a neural systems level explanation for the effort and fatigue that can be experienced during speech recognition in challenging listening conditions. Neuroimaging studies of speech recognition consistently demonstrate that challenging listening conditions engage neural systems that are used to monitor and optimize performance across a wide range of tasks. These systems appear to improve speech recognition in younger and older adults, but sustained engagement of these systems also appears to produce an experience of effort and fatigue that may affect the value of communication. When considered in the broader context of the neuroimaging and decision making literature, the speech recognition findings from functional imaging studies indicate that the expected value, or expected level of speech recognition given the difficulty of listening conditions, should be considered when measuring effort and fatigue. The authors propose that the behavioral economics or neuroeconomics of listening can provide a conceptual and experimental framework for understanding effort and fatigue that may have clinical significance.
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49
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Yusuf PA, Hubka P, Tillein J, Kral A. Induced cortical responses require developmental sensory experience. Brain 2017; 140:3153-3165. [PMID: 29155975 PMCID: PMC5841147 DOI: 10.1093/brain/awx286] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/02/2017] [Accepted: 09/12/2017] [Indexed: 01/25/2023] Open
Abstract
Sensory areas of the cerebral cortex integrate the sensory inputs with the ongoing activity. We studied how complete absence of auditory experience affects this process in a higher mammal model of complete sensory deprivation, the congenitally deaf cat. Cortical responses were elicited by intracochlear electric stimulation using cochlear implants in adult hearing controls and deaf cats. Additionally, in hearing controls, acoustic stimuli were used to assess the effect of stimulus mode (electric versus acoustic) on the cortical responses. We evaluated time-frequency representations of local field potential recorded simultaneously in the primary auditory cortex and a higher-order area, the posterior auditory field, known to be differentially involved in cross-modal (visual) reorganization in deaf cats. The results showed the appearance of evoked (phase-locked) responses at early latencies (<100 ms post-stimulus) and more abundant induced (non-phase-locked) responses at later latencies (>150 ms post-stimulus). In deaf cats, substantially reduced induced responses were observed in overall power as well as duration in both investigated fields. Additionally, a reduction of ongoing alpha band activity was found in the posterior auditory field (but not in primary auditory cortex) of deaf cats. The present study demonstrates that induced activity requires developmental experience and suggests that higher-order areas involved in the cross-modal reorganization show more auditory deficits than primary areas.
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Affiliation(s)
- Prasandhya Astagiri Yusuf
- Institute of AudioNeuroTechnology and Department of Experimental Otology, ENT Clinics, Hannover Medical School, Germany
| | - Peter Hubka
- Institute of AudioNeuroTechnology and Department of Experimental Otology, ENT Clinics, Hannover Medical School, Germany
| | - Jochen Tillein
- Institute of AudioNeuroTechnology and Department of Experimental Otology, ENT Clinics, Hannover Medical School, Germany.,ENT Clinics, J. W. Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
| | - Andrej Kral
- Institute of AudioNeuroTechnology and Department of Experimental Otology, ENT Clinics, Hannover Medical School, Germany.,School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, The University of Texas at Dallas, USA
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50
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Teng X, Tian X, Rowland J, Poeppel D. Concurrent temporal channels for auditory processing: Oscillatory neural entrainment reveals segregation of function at different scales. PLoS Biol 2017; 15:e2000812. [PMID: 29095816 PMCID: PMC5667736 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.2000812] [Citation(s) in RCA: 49] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/13/2016] [Accepted: 10/10/2017] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Natural sounds convey perceptually relevant information over multiple timescales, and the necessary extraction of multi-timescale information requires the auditory system to work over distinct ranges. The simplest hypothesis suggests that temporal modulations are encoded in an equivalent manner within a reasonable intermediate range. We show that the human auditory system selectively and preferentially tracks acoustic dynamics concurrently at 2 timescales corresponding to the neurophysiological theta band (4-7 Hz) and gamma band ranges (31-45 Hz) but, contrary to expectation, not at the timescale corresponding to alpha (8-12 Hz), which has also been found to be related to auditory perception. Listeners heard synthetic acoustic stimuli with temporally modulated structures at 3 timescales (approximately 190-, approximately 100-, and approximately 30-ms modulation periods) and identified the stimuli while undergoing magnetoencephalography recording. There was strong intertrial phase coherence in the theta band for stimuli of all modulation rates and in the gamma band for stimuli with corresponding modulation rates. The alpha band did not respond in a similar manner. Classification analyses also revealed that oscillatory phase reliably tracked temporal dynamics but not equivalently across rates. Finally, mutual information analyses quantifying the relation between phase and cochlear-scaled correlations also showed preferential processing in 2 distinct regimes, with the alpha range again yielding different patterns. The results support the hypothesis that the human auditory system employs (at least) a 2-timescale processing mode, in which lower and higher perceptual sampling scales are segregated by an intermediate temporal regime in the alpha band that likely reflects different underlying computations.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Xing Tian
- New York University Shanghai, Shanghai, China
- NYU-ECNU Institute of Brain and Cognitive Science, NYU Shanghai, Shanghai, China
| | - Jess Rowland
- School of Visual Arts, New York, New York, United States of America
- Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, New York, United States of America
| | - David Poeppel
- Max-Planck-Institute, Frankfurt, Germany
- Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, New York, United States of America
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