Spatial Auditory Plasticity

描述(申请人提供)：本项目的目标是描述和理解空间听觉知觉是如何被过去的经验改变的。实验将检验这一假设，即空间听觉加工是分层的，经验在不同的加工阶段通过不同的机制影响空间知觉。具体地说，实验将测试1)外显训练是否迅速改变空间知觉与偏心空间知觉位置的映射方式；2)房间声学的内隐学习改变空间线索整合形成空间知觉的方式，从而提高房间经验的定位可靠性；3)路径的早期阶段没有改变，但包括动态的、非线性的影响，改变了后期加工阶段可以获得的信息。这些假设将通过测量空间定位精度和可变性的行为实验、表征空间声学提示如何受到不同声学环境影响的声学测量，以及探索处理结构对实验结果的解释的计算模型来解决。这项工作对于确定正常的人类听者如何在日常环境中适应和校准空间知觉，以便在不断变化的声学环境中保持准确的空间知觉至关重要。结果将有助于阐明过去的经验如何影响空间听觉加工，改变空间听觉知觉，并影响空间分辨率和定位精度。通过研究反映处理不同阶段的变化并在一系列时间尺度上影响行为的知觉现象，这个项目将提供一幅正常听觉系统如何保持空间听觉知觉与其他形式的知觉一致的连贯图景。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The goal of this project is to characterize and understand how spatial auditory perception is altered by past experience. Experiments will test the hypothesis that spatial auditory processing is hierarchical and that experience influences spatial perception through different mechanisms at different processing stages. Specifically, experiments will test whether 1) explicit training rapidly alters how spatial percepts are mapped to perceived locations in exocentric space; whereas 2) implicit learning of room acoustics alters how spatial cues are integrated to form spatial percepts, leading to improvements in localization reliability with experience in a room; and 3) early stages of the pathway do not change, but include dynamic, nonlinear effects that alter what information is available to later processing stages. These hypotheses will be addressed through behavioral experiments that measure spatial localization accuracy and variability, acoustic measurements that characterize how spatial acoustic cues are affected by different acoustical environments, and computational models that explore what processing structures account for experimental results. This work is critical for identifying how the normal human listener adapts and calibrates spatial perception in everyday settings in order to maintain accurate spatial perception in changing acoustic environments. Results will help to elucidate how past experience influences spatial auditory processing, changes spatial auditory perception, and affects spatial resolution and localization accuracy. By studying perceptual phenomena that reflect changes at different stages of processing and affect behavior over a range of time scales, this project will provide a coherent picture of how the normal auditory system keeps spatial auditory percepts in registry with percepts from other modalities.