Characterizing the effects of hearing loss and hearing aids on the neural code for music

表征听力损失和助听器对音乐神经编码的影响

• 批准号: MR/W019787/1
• 负责人: Nicholas Lesica
• 金额: $ 71.33万
• 依托单位: University College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2022 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=MR%2FW019787%2F1
• 关键词: Characterizing; effects; hearing; loss; aids

Music has always been fundamental to the human experience. It has been a part of every known society, serving a variety of roles from social or ritualistic to aesthetic or therapeutic. But with the advent of modern digital technologies, music is now ubiquitous. A recent UK study found that people polled by random text message were listening to music nearly half of the time.For many people, the ability to enjoy music is essential for their wellbeing. Unfortunately, this ability is increasingly at risk because of the growing burden of hearing loss (approximately 500 million people worldwide; 11 million people in the UK). Current hearing aids, which are designed to improve the perception of speech, often distort music. But without a detailed understanding of the auditory processing of music and how it is disrupted by hearing loss, it remains unclear how the benefits of hearing aids for music can be improved.We are proposing to characterize the auditory processing of music through study of the neural code -- the patterns of neural activity that underlie perception. We will study the neural code for music with and without hearing loss and hearing aids in an animal model of human hearing. The use of animals for this research is essential because the perception of complex sounds like music depends on fine details of neural activity patterns that cannot be observed directly in humans. We have recently developed new methods for large-scale recordings that allow us to observe the activity of hundreds of individual neurons simultaneously, which will enable us to provide a comprehensive characterization of the neural code. We will complement our study of the neural code with a large-scale survey of hearing aid users to help us identify the aspects of our results that are most relevant to the real-world experiences of human listeners.Our preliminary results reveal a number of effects of hearing loss on the neural code that appear to be unique to music. Thus, we expect the results of the project not only to yield new fundamental knowledge about neural coding but also to provide a foundation for the development of improved assistive listening devices and software that can significantly improve the perception and enjoyment of music for listeners with hearing loss.

音乐一直是人类体验的基础。它已经成为每个已知社会的一部分，扮演着从社交或仪式到审美或治疗的各种角色。但随着现代数字技术的到来，音乐现在无处不在。英国最近的一项研究发现，接受随机短信调查的人近一半的时间都在听音乐。对许多人来说，欣赏音乐的能力对他们的健康至关重要。不幸的是，由于听力损失的负担越来越大(全球约有5亿人，英国有1100万人)，这种能力正面临越来越大的风险。目前的助听器旨在改善人们对语言的感知，但它们往往会扭曲音乐。但在没有详细了解音乐的听觉处理过程以及听力损失是如何干扰它的情况下，仍然不清楚如何改善音乐助听器的好处。我们建议通过研究神经代码来表征音乐的听觉处理过程--神经活动的模式是感知的基础。我们将在人类听力的动物模型中研究有无听力损失和助听器的音乐的神经编码。使用动物进行这项研究是至关重要的，因为对音乐等复杂声音的感知取决于神经活动模式的细节，而人类无法直接观察到这些细节。我们最近开发了大规模记录的新方法，使我们能够同时观察数百个单个神经元的活动，这将使我们能够提供神经代码的全面特征。我们将通过对助听器使用者的大规模调查来补充我们对神经代码的研究，以帮助我们确定结果中与人类听者的真实世界经验最相关的方面。我们的初步结果揭示了听力损失对神经代码的一些似乎是音乐所独有的影响。因此，我们预计该项目的结果不仅将产生关于神经编码的新的基础知识，而且还将为改进的辅助收听设备和软件的开发提供基础，这些设备和软件可以显著改善听力损失听众对音乐的感知和享受。