How do we attend dynamically in time during listening?

语音通常很难理解，或者是由于情境要求（例如，拥挤的酒吧中的背景语音），或者由于感觉系统中与年龄相关的变化而导致语音编码退化。我的研究计划旨在提高我们对听觉感觉编码和认知处理如何相互作用以塑造听力体验和言语理解的基本机制的认识，以及神经回路中与年龄相关的变化如何导致不良听力体验。该计划的长期目标是提供机械基础，最终可以帮助听力困难的人更好地理解退化的语音，并使他们能够保持沟通。我为这个NSERC DG提出的研究考虑了两个关键因素，这两个因素对真实的生活中的言语理解至关重要，但迄今为止很少受到关注：情境需求随时间而变化（例如，背景语音强度的变化），并且并非所有单词都与收听者跟随对话相关。因此，听众可以在预期难以收听和预期会出现相关信息的时候专门参加，以避免疲劳。控制注意力的时间和强度使倾听成为时间动态的。老年人与认知控制能力下降有关，但很少有人知道这是如何影响的能力，招聘注意力动态的时间点时，在声学环境中的相关信息预计会发生。这项工作将提供一个详细的帐户，听众如何参加动态在听的时间。这项研究有四个具体目标：（1）研究个体在听力过程中如何动态地调动注意力;（2）研究语音相关信息（例如，时间规律性、句法结构）在听力过程中影响动态注意的时间;（3）识别支持动态注意的关键大脑区域和网络;（4）探索听力过程中动态控制注意的能力如何随年龄变化。我们将利用一种综合的方法，结合行为，眼睛（瞳孔测量和微跳），和神经（脑电图/脑磁图）措施，全面表征人们的能力，在听的时候，潜在的机制，以及老化可能产生的影响动态出席。了解动态控制注意力的基本过程将有助于更好地了解导致不良听力体验的因素。我们的工作将展示人们如何/何时参与他们的倾听环境，以及他们何时决定停止倾听。这对于制定包容所有能力的公共空间设计准则至关重要。我们的研究将进一步促进基于生理学的技术（例如，游戏），其依赖于用户对注意力的动态调节。

Speech is often difficult to understand, either due to situational demands (e.g., background speech in a crowded bar), or due to age-related changes in sensory systems that result in degraded speech encoding. My research program aims to improve our knowledge of the fundamental mechanisms of how auditory sensory encoding and cognitive processing interact to shape listening experiences and speech comprehension, and how age-related changes in neural circuits lead to adverse listening experiences. The long-term goal of this program is to deliver the mechanistic foundations that ultimately can help people with hearing difficulties to comprehend degraded speech better and to enable them to stay engaged in communication. The research that I propose for this NSERC DG considers two key factors that are crucial for speech comprehension in real life but have thus far received little attention: situational demands vary over time (e.g., changes in the intensity of background speech) and not all words are relevant for a listener to follow a conversation. Listeners can thus attend specifically at times when listening is expected to be difficult and when relevant information is expected to occur in order to avoid fatigue. Control over the timing and magnitude of attention makes listening temporally dynamic. Older adulthood is associated with reduced cognitive control, but little is known about how this affects the ability to recruit attention dynamically to points in time when relevant information in acoustic environments is expected to occur. This work will deliver a detailed account of how listeners attend dynamically over time during listening. The proposed research has four specific aims: (1) to examine how well individuals can recruit attention dynamically during listening; (2) to investigate how speech-relevant information (e.g., temporal regularity, syntactic structure) affect dynamic attention in time during listening; (3) to identify the key brain regions and networks that support dynamic attention; and (4) to explore how the ability to control attention dynamically during listening changes with age. We will utilize an integrative approach that combines behavioral, eye (pupillometry & microsaccades), and neural (electro-/magnetoencephalography) measures to comprehensively characterize people's ability to attend dynamically in time during listening, the underlying mechanisms, and the effects aging may have. Understanding the fundamental processes that underlie dynamic control over attention will help gain better knowledge of the factors contributing to adverse listening experiences. Our work will demonstrate how/when people engage in their listening environments, and when they decide to stop listening. This will be important for creating guidelines for the design of public spaces that are inclusive of all abilities. Our research will further contribute to physiology-based technology (e.g., gaming) that relies on a user's dynamic regulation of attention.