Integrating Cognitive and Sensorimotor Systems in Stuttering and Speech Production

将认知和感觉运动系统整合到口吃和言语产生中

• 批准号: 1513770
• 负责人: Eric Jackson
• 金额: $ 20.83万
• 依托单位: University of Iowa
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-07-01 至 2017-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1513770&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Integrating; Cognitive; Sensorimotor; Systems; Stuttering

The Directorate of Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences offers postdoctoral research fellowships to provide opportunities for recent doctoral graduates to obtain additional training, to gain research experience under the sponsorship of established scientists, and to broaden their scientific horizons beyond their undergraduate and graduate training. Postdoctoral fellowships are further designed to assist new scientists to direct their research efforts across traditional disciplinary lines and to avail themselves of unique research resources, sites, and facilities, including at foreign locations. This postdoctoral fellowship supports a rising scientist in the interdisciplinary area of speech production, cognitive science and neurocomputational modeling. Speech production is a complex skill that hinges on the real-time integration of cognitive and sensorimotor processes. Contemporary models of speech production pay little attention to salient cognitive processes such as intention, attention, and awareness. One way to further basic understanding of the critical link between cognitive and sensorimotor systems during speech production is to examine typically and atypically developing systems. This project investigates stuttering, a neurodevelopmental speech disorder, by leveraging the well-known phenomenon of anticipation. Anticipation refers to the a priori sense a speaker has that upcoming speech will be stuttered. Examining anticipation and speech behavior through the lens of a pathological system (i.e., a stuttering system) will ultimately shed light on a basic question in speech research?how cognition, perception, and action underlie speech production and its development. Findings from this work will also have real-world applicability as they will support the development of tailored diagnostic and clinical procedures for those who experience stuttering and its related social and emotional consequences.This innovative work combines computational modeling and empirical investigation to develop and test a model of stuttered speech production. It applies principles of Dynamic Field Theory (DFT), an established neurocomputational approach to modeling that formalizes the relationship between cognitive and sensorimotor systems. DFT has benefitted from recent advances in cognitive science, mathematical biology, motor control, developmental psychology, and theoretical neuroscience, highlighting the multidisciplinary nature of this work. Critically, DFT integrates real-time processes with processes of learning and development. Thus, the framework is poised to contribute to an understanding of the relationship between in-the-moment speech behaviors and their cognitive underpinnings that often occur over longer timescales, and are more difficult to observe. The experimental component of this project employs optical tracking and functional near-infrared spectroscopy, allowing for direct comparisons at behavioral, kinematic, and neurophysiological levels. Specific aims of this project include: (1) extending a preliminary DFT-based model of typical speech production, as well as attempting to break the model in ways that are reflective of stuttering; and (2) testing the model empirically in a cross-sectional study that examines the development of anticipation of stuttering across the life span. This proposal is also supported by the NSF EPSCoR.

社会、行为和经济科学局提供博士后研究奖学金，为新近毕业的博士毕业生提供获得额外培训的机会，在知名科学家的赞助下获得研究经验，并在本科生和研究生培训之外拓宽他们的科学视野。博士后奖学金的进一步设计是为了帮助新科学家引导他们的研究努力跨越传统的学科界限，并利用独特的研究资源、地点和设施，包括在国外。这一博士后奖学金支持一位在语音产生、认知科学和神经计算建模的跨学科领域正在崛起的科学家。言语产生是一项复杂的技能，它依赖于认知和感觉运动过程的实时整合。当代的言语产生模型很少关注显著的认知过程，如意图、注意力和意识。要进一步了解言语产生过程中认知系统和感觉运动系统之间的关键联系，一种方法是检查典型的和非典型的发育系统。这个项目通过利用众所周知的期待现象来研究口吃，这是一种神经发育性言语障碍。预期指的是演讲者有一种先天的感觉，即将发表的演讲会口吃。通过病理系统(即口吃系统)的视角来研究预期和言语行为，最终将有助于揭示言语研究中的一个基本问题--认知、感知和行动如何构成言语产生和发展的基础。这项工作的发现也将具有现实世界的适用性，因为它们将支持为经历口吃及其相关社会和情感后果的人开发量身定制的诊断和临床程序。这项创新工作结合了计算建模和实证研究，以开发和测试口吃语音产生的模型。它应用了动态场理论(DFT)的原理，这是一种公认的神经计算方法来建模，形式化了认知和感觉运动系统之间的关系。DFT受益于认知科学、数学生物学、运动控制、发展心理学和理论神经科学的最新进展，突出了这项工作的多学科性质。至关重要的是，DFT将实时过程与学习和发展过程相结合。因此，该框架有助于理解瞬间言语行为及其认知基础之间的关系，这种关系往往发生在更长的时间尺度上，更难观察到。该项目的实验部分使用光学跟踪和功能性近红外光谱，允许在行为、运动学和神经生理学水平上进行直接比较。该项目的具体目标包括：(1)扩展基于DFT的典型言语产生的初步模型，并试图以反映口吃的方式打破该模型；以及(2)在一项横断面研究中对该模型进行经验性测试，该研究考察口吃预期在整个生命周期内的发展。这一提议也得到了NSF EPSCoR的支持。