Attention and Stimulus-Driven Processes in Auditory Object Perception

描述(申请人提供)：听觉场景分析，即分析和组织传入声音的混合到连贯的信息流的能力，是听觉系统的基本过程，允许我们在拥挤的房间中跟随单一声音或在管弦乐套装中聆听长笛的旋律。准确的语音感知依赖于辨别和分离声音信号中声音元素的能力。尽管这一过程对人类行为很重要，但人们对帮助组织听觉输入的神经机制知之甚少。该项目的长期目标是了解人脑如何将声学输入组织成有意义的听觉对象。这些实验旨在通过明确刺激驱动和注意力机制之间的关系来评估感觉输入和行为反应之间的加工阶段，这些机制产生了对连贯听觉环境的感知。这将使用高时间分辨率的事件相关电位(ERPs)与行为方法相结合来实现，以比较刺激驱动的听觉过程的结果与在各种实验条件下对相同声音的专注处理所产生的感知。拟议的实验结果将为感知复杂听觉场景所涉及的过程提供新的见解，并有助于更好地理解正常和受损听觉感知背后的自动和注意机制的贡献。中枢听觉处理缺陷被认为在许多认知障碍(如自闭症、阅读障碍)中起着关键作用。使用电生理方法，结合行为方法来了解刺激驱动的过程和注意在知觉中是如何相互作用的，将促进我们对加工受损的理解，这对于制定诊断策略和康复治疗至关重要。由于获得某些事件相关电位不需要受试者的反应，这种方法对于儿童和任务要求可能很困难的受损人群是有利的，因此有可能成为诊断和评估中枢听觉加工缺陷的重要非侵入性工具。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Auditory scene analysis, the ability to parse and organize the mixture of incoming sounds to coherent streams of information, is a fundamental process of the auditory system that allows us to follow a single voice in the midst of a crowded room or to listen to the melody of the flute within an orchestral suite. Accurate speech perception relies on the ability to discriminate and segregate sound elements in the acoustic signal. Despite the importance of this process for human behavior, the neural mechanisms that subserve the organization of the auditory input are poorly understood. The long term goal of the project is to understand how the human brain organizes acoustic input into meaningful auditory objects. The experiments proposed are aimed at evaluating the processing stages between sensory input and behavioral response by specifying the relationship between the stimulus-driven and attentive mechanisms that give rise to the perception of a coherent auditory environment. This will be accomplished using high temporal resolution of event-related potentials (ERPs) in conjunction with behavioral methods to compare the outcome of stimulus-driven auditory processes with the perception resulting from attentive processing of the same sounds across various experimental conditions. The results of the proposed experiments will provide new insights into the processes involved in perceiving complex auditory scenes and lead to a greater understanding of the contribution of automatic and attentional mechanisms underlying both normal and impaired auditory perception. Deficits in central auditory processing are thought to play a key role in many cognitive disorders (e.g., autism, dyslexia). Using electrophysiological measures, in conjunction with behavioral methods to understand how stimulus-driven processes and attention interact in perception will advance our understanding of impaired processing, which is essential for developing diagnostic strategies and rehabilitative treatments. Since subject response is not needed for obtaining certain ERPs, this methodological approach is advantageous for use with children and impaired populations for whom task requirements may be difficult, and thus has the potential to be an important non-invasive tool for diagnosis and assessment of central auditory processing deficits.