CENTRAL FACTORS IN AUDITORY MASKING

听觉掩蔽的核心因素

• 批准号: 6603811
• 负责人: Gerald, Jr Kidd
• 金额: $ 26.65万
• 依托单位: BOSTON UNIVERSITY (CHARLES RIVER CAMPUS)
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2000
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2000-07-01 至 2005-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/6603811
• 关键词: auditory stimulus; behavioral /social science research tag; clinical research; human subject; perceptual maskings; psychoacoustics; sensorineural hearing loss; sound frequency; sound perception

The goal of this work is to gain a better understanding of the role of central factors in auditory masking in listeners with cochlear hearing loss. The work has theoretical significance for the study and remediation of hearing impairment by aiming to better understand the causes of the communication difficulties experienced by listeners with cochlear hearing loss. The proposal is based on a theory that identifies two types of masking that occur at different physiological levels. Peripheral or "energetic" masking occurs because of overlapping patterns of excitation in the cochlea and has been studied in detail for many years. Central or "informational" masking involves cognitive processes related to the perceptual organization of sound images and the analysis of sound patterns. Informational masking is not well understood, and occurs despite a robust representation of the signal in the auditory periphery. The purpose of this study is to extend the work on informational masking to listeners with hearing loss. This knowledge is critical because of the prevalence of auditory pathologies affecting the sensory mechanism and the extreme difficulty in communication such pathologies often cause, particularly in noisy listening conditions. Although it is clear that sensory pathology affects the spectral and temporal analyses performed at the periphery, there appears to be a significant component to masking that cannot be attributed purely to peripheral deficits. The plan is to test the hypothesis that listeners with sensorineural hearing loss experience abnormally large amounts of informational masking in certain conditions and make poor use of the cues that normally reduce informational masking. This hypothesis will be examined through a series of psychoacoustic experiments employing listeners with cochlear hearing loss. The goal is to relate the amount of informational masking to factors such as etiology and configuration of loss, auditory filter characteristics and processing efficiency, age and speech recognition in noise.

本研究的目的是为了更好地了解耳蜗听力损失听者听觉掩蔽的中心因素的作用。本研究旨在更好地了解耳蜗听力损失听者沟通困难的原因，对听力障碍的研究和修复具有理论意义。该提议基于一种理论，该理论确定了发生在不同生理水平上的两种类型的掩蔽。外周或“能量”掩蔽是由于耳蜗的兴奋模式重叠而发生的，并且已经详细研究了多年。中央或“信息”掩蔽涉及与声音图像的感知组织和声音模式分析相关的认知过程。信息掩蔽还没有被很好地理解，尽管在听觉外围有一个强大的信号表示，它还是会发生。本研究的目的是将信息掩蔽的研究扩展到听力损失的听者。这方面的知识是至关重要的，因为听觉病理影响感觉机制的普遍存在，以及这种病理经常导致的交流极端困难，特别是在嘈杂的听力条件下。虽然很明显，感觉病理会影响外周的频谱和时间分析，但似乎有一个重要的组成部分，不能纯粹归因于外周的缺陷。该计划是为了验证这样一种假设，即感觉神经性听力损失的听者在某些条件下会经历异常大量的信息掩蔽，并且不能很好地利用通常会减少信息掩蔽的线索。这一假设将通过使用耳蜗听力损失的听众进行一系列心理声学实验来检验。目标是将信息掩蔽的数量与诸如损失的病因和配置，听觉过滤器特性和处理效率，年龄和噪声中的语音识别等因素联系起来。