How voice familiarity facilitates intelligibility of degraded and masked speech

尽管受到其他来源的干扰，跟踪和理解某个特定的对话伙伴是我们大多数人每天都能完成的壮举。然而，需要许多处理操作，以便当听到由许多不同声源(及其回声)组成的复杂听觉信号时，可以识别、跟踪和理解特定的一个声源(即，语音)。我和我的受训者研究经验和先验知识如何影响声音的倾听和理解，特别是在嘈杂的日常条件下。知识引导的过程(例如，使用有意义的语境来感知地填充掩蔽或退化的语音)可以显著改善感知组织和言语感知，但通常需要注意，这可能是为什么在嘈杂的社交环境中沟通是费力的，而且往往令人沮丧的原因。一个未被开发的基于知识的因素可能会提高理解能力，但实际上会减少听力努力，那就是熟悉说话者的声音。Johnsrude等人(2013)证明，人们可以利用对非常熟悉的声音(他们的配偶的声音)的知识，不仅在干扰陌生人的声音存在时更好地跟踪它，而且还可以忽略它，以便更有效地理解陌生人的声音。这项初步研究表明，从特定声音的经历中获得的线索可能对自然主义情景下的言语理解具有非常重要的促进作用；但对它们几乎一无所知。本文提出的研究将通过四个目标开始填补这一空白：*1)考察需要多少经验以及何种经验才能使声音变得熟悉才能提高清晰度；*2)确定对使熟悉的声音受益最重要的声音的声学特征；*3)研究声音熟悉是否会减少听力努力；*4)比较熟悉和陌生声音中支持言语感知的神经(和认知)机制。*我的研究计划的目标是建立一个更详细的理论解释，说明熟悉的声音如何有助于理解退化的和掩饰的言语。这项工作对于我们理解言语理解背后的认知过程，以及解决现实世界言语理解受损的问题都是具有变革性的。这是必要的第一步：开发听力假体，保留提高声音可理解性的基本线索；使我们能够改善学校和公共场所的听力环境，以便可以利用熟悉的语音信息；使老年人能够在具有挑战性的听力环境中更全面地利用熟悉的语音信息。

Following and understanding one particular conversational partner, despite interference from other sources, is a feat most of us accomplish every day. However, many processing operations are required so that, when hearing a complex auditory signal consisting of many different sources of sound (and their echoes), one source in particular (i.e., a voice) can be identified, tracked, and understood. My trainees and I study how experience and prior knowledge feed into voice listening and comprehension, particularly in noisy, everyday, conditions. Knowledge-guided processes (e.g., the use of meaningful context to perceptually fill in' masked or degraded speech) can dramatically improve perceptual organization and speech perception, but often require attention, which is probably why communicating in noisy social situations is effortful and often frustrating. One underexplored knowledge-based factor that may enhance comprehension while actually reducing listening effort is familiarity with a talker's voice. Johnsrude et al (2013) demonstrated that people can exploit knowledge of a highly familiar voice (their spouse's) not only to track it better in the presence of an interfering stranger's voice, but also to ignore it so as to comprehend a stranger's voice more effectively. This preliminary study indicates that cues derived from experience with particular voices are potentially highly significant facilitators of speech comprehension in naturalistic situations; but almost nothing is known about them. The research proposed here will begin to fill this gap, through four aims:******1) to examine how much experience, and what kind, is required for voices to become familiar so as to benefit intelligibility; ***2) to identify the acoustic characteristics of voices that are most important for enabling familiar-voice benefit; ***3) to examine whether voice familiarity reduces listening effort; ***4) to compare the neural (and cognitive) mechanisms supporting perception of speech in familiar and unfamiliar voices.******The goal of my research program is to develop a more detailed theoretical account of how familiar voices contribute to comprehension of degraded and masked speech. This work is transformational both for our understanding of the cognitive processes underlying speech comprehension, and for tackling the problem of impaired real-world speech comprehension. It is a necessary first step to: developing hearing prostheses that preserve essential cues that enhance intelligibility of a voice; enabling us to improve listening environments in schools and public places so familiar-voice information can be exploited; and enabling older people to take more complete advantage of familiar-voice information in challenging listening environments.