Neural Coding and Perception of Learned Vocalizations

听觉和声音是人类交流的主要工具。我们早期的听觉经验 母语塑造了我们余生的听觉方式。在12个月大的时候，我们已经 发展了我们在社会环境中听到的语音音素的听觉感知技能。这个早期 当我们学习说话时，听觉处理的专门化促进了感觉运动的整合;准确 一岁时的音素辨别能力与几年后的语言熟练程度相关。一个重要 我们的目标是了解我们如何获得和使用语音，以及当我们不能使用语音时会出现什么问题。 语音决定了发声的发展经验如何塑造听觉处理， 成功沟通的感觉。虽然很明显，生命中学习语言的最佳时间 发育仅限于青春期之前，我们不知道为什么年轻的大脑特别敏感， 声乐经验或声乐学习如何在沟通服务中塑造听觉回路。我们 我建议将声乐学习中的操作与中枢听觉处理和行为的测量相结合 以确定早期的听觉-发声经验如何塑造听觉皮层和感知的发展， 鸣禽拟议的实验将确定经验依赖性发展的神经机制 声音交流的方式。这项研究对NIH的使命有三方面的重要意义。首先 这项工作将确定伴随着正常发声学习里程碑的听觉皮层处理的变化。 其次，这项工作将测试延迟和受损的声音发展对听觉处理的影响， perception.第三，我们的研究结果将为经验操作和培训如何改善提供见解 预防、诊断和治疗发育性言语障碍，如儿童中观察到的言语障碍 患有听觉频谱障碍

Hearing and voice are the principal instruments of human communication. Early auditory experience of our native language(s) shapes the way we hear for the rest of our lives. By 12 months of age, we have already developed auditory perceptual skills around the speech phonemes we hear in social environments. This early specialization of auditory processing facilitates sensorimotor integration as we learn to speak; accurate phoneme discrimination in the first year of life is correlated with language proficiency years later. An important goal in the pursuit to understand how we acquire and use speech and what goes wrong when we can't use speech is determining how developmental experience of vocal sounds shapes auditory processing and perception for successful communication. While it is clear that the optimal time in life for language development is limited to before puberty, we do not know why the young brain is particularly sensitive to auditory-vocal experience or how vocal learning shapes auditory circuits in the service of communication. We propose to integrate manipulations in vocal learning with measures of central auditory processing and behavior to determine how early auditory-vocal experience shapes development of the auditory cortex and perception in songbirds. The proposed experiments will identify neural mechanisms for experience-dependent development of vocal communication. The significance of the proposed research to the NIH mission is three-fold. First, this work will identify changes in auditory cortical processing that accompany milestones in normal vocal learning. Second, the work will test the impact of delayed and impaired vocal development on auditory processing and perception. Third, our results will provide insights into how experience manipulations and training can improve prevention, diagnosis and treatment of developmental speech impairments such as those observed in children with auditory spectrum disorders.