Search results for "auditory perception"

Comprehensive auditory discrimination profiles recorded with a fast parametric musical multi-feature mismatch negativity paradigm

2016

Abstract Objective Mismatch negativity (MMN), a component of the auditory event-related potential (ERP) in response to auditory-expectancy violation, is sensitive to central auditory processing deficits associated with several clinical conditions and to auditory skills deriving from musical expertise. This sensitivity is more evident for stimuli integrated in complex sound contexts. This study tested whether increasing magnitudes of deviation (levels) entail increasing MMN amplitude (or decreasing latency), aiming to create a balanced version of the musical multi-feature paradigm towards measurement of extensive auditory discrimination profiles in auditory expertise or deficits. Methods Usi…

2013

To identify factors limiting performance in multitone intensity discrimination, we presented sequences of five pure tones alternating in level between loud (85 dB SPL) and soft (30, 55, or 80 dB SPL). In the “overall-intensity task”, listeners detected a level increment on all of the five tones. In the “masking task”, the level increment was imposed only on the soft tones, rendering the soft tones targets and loud tones task-irrelevant maskers. Decision weights quantifying the importance of the five tone levels for the decision were estimated using methods of molecular psychophysics. Compatible with previous studies, listeners placed higher weights on the loud tones than on the soft tones i…

Atypical perceptual narrowing in prematurely born infants is associated with compromised language acquisition at 2 years of age

2010

Abstract Background Early auditory experiences are a prerequisite for speech and language acquisition. In healthy children, phoneme discrimination abilities improve for native and degrade for unfamiliar, socially irrelevant phoneme contrasts between 6 and 12 months of age as the brain tunes itself to, and specializes in the native spoken language. This process is known as perceptual narrowing, and has been found to predict normal native language acquisition. Prematurely born infants are known to be at an elevated risk for later language problems, but it remains unclear whether these problems relate to early perceptual narrowing. To address this question, we investigated early neurophysiolog…

Discrimination of tonal and atonal music in congenital amusia: The advantage of implicit tasks

2016

International audience; Congenital amusia is a neurodevelopmental disorder of music perception and production, which has been attributed to a major deficit in pitch processing. While most studies and diagnosis tests have used explicit investigation methods, recent studies using implicit investigation approaches have revealed some unimpaired pitch structure processing in congenital amusia. The present study investigated amusic individuals' processing of tonal structures (e.g., musical structures respecting the Western tonal system) via three different questions. Amusic participants and their matched controls judged tonal versions (original musical excerpts) and atonal versions (with manipula…

Both contextual regularity and selective attention affect the reduction of precision‐weighted prediction errors but in distinct manners

2020

Predictive coding model of perception postulates that the primary objective of the brain is to infer the causes of sensory inputs by reducing prediction errors (i.e., the discrepancy between expected and actual information). Moreover, prediction errors are weighted by their precision (i.e., inverse variance), which quantifies the degree of certainty about the variables. There is accumulating evidence that the reduction of precision-weighted prediction errors can be affected by contextual regularity (as an external factor) and selective attention (as an internal factor). However, it is unclear whether the two factors function together or separately. Here we used electroencephalography (EEG) …

Effects of Selective Attention on Syntax Processing in Music and Language

2010

Abstract The present study investigated the effects of auditory selective attention on the processing of syntactic information in music and speech using event-related potentials. Spoken sentences or musical chord sequences were either presented in isolation, or simultaneously. When presented simultaneously, participants had to focus their attention either on speech, or on music. Final words of sentences and final harmonies of chord sequences were syntactically either correct or incorrect. Irregular chords elicited an early right anterior negativity (ERAN), whose amplitude was decreased when music was simultaneously presented with speech, compared to when only music was presented. However, t…

The feeling of familiarity for music in patients with a unilateral temporal lobe lesion: A gating study

2015

International audience; Previous research has indicated that the medial temporal lobe (MTL), and more specifically the perirhinal cortex, plays a role in the feeling of familiarity for non-musical stimuli. Here, we examined contribution of the MTL to the feeling of familiarity for music by testing patients with unilateral MTL lesions. We used a gating paradigm: segments of familiar and unfamiliar musical excerpts were played with increasing durations (250, 500, 1000, 2000, 4000 ms and complete excerpts), and participants provided familiarity judgments for each segment. Based on the hypothesis that patients might need longer segments than healthy controls (HC) to identify excerpts as familia…

Selecting one of two regular sound sequences : Perceptual and motor effects of tempo

2008

This study assessed the influence of tempo on selecting a sound sequence. In Exp. 1, synchronization with one of the two regular subsequences in a complex sequence was measured. 30 participants indicated a preference for the fastest subsequence when subsequences were in a slow tempo range (≥ 500 msec. IOI), and with the slower subsequence when they were in the fast tempo range (≤ 300 msec. IOI). These results were replicated using a perceptual task (Exp. 2 and 3) in which the 30 listeners had to detect a temporal irregularity in one of the two subsequences. Detection was better when the temporal irregularity was in the fastest subsequence than in the slowest one when the complex sequence w…

Temporal weights in the perception of sound intensity: Effects of sound duration and number of temporal segments

2018

Loudness is a fundamental aspect of auditory perception that is closely related to the physical level of the sound. However, it has been demonstrated that, in contrast to a sound level meter, human listeners do not weight all temporal segments of a sound equally. Instead, the beginning of a sound is more important for loudness estimation than later temporal portions. The present study investigates the mechanism underlying this primacy effect by varying the number of equal-duration temporal segments (5 and 20) and the total duration of the sound (1.0 to 10.0 s) in a factorial design. Pronounced primacy effects were observed for all 20-segment sounds. The temporal weights for the five-segment…

Do informal musical activities shape auditory skill development in preschool-age children?

2013

The influence of formal musical training on auditory cognition has been well established. For the majority of children, however, musical experience does not primarily consist of adult-guided training on a musical instrument. Instead, young children mostly engage in everyday musical activities such as singing and musical play. Here, we review recent electrophysiological and behavioral studies carried out in our laboratory and elsewhere which have begun to map how developing auditory skills are shaped by such informal musical activities both at home and in playschool-type settings. Although more research is still needed, the evidence emerging from these studies suggests that, in addition to f…