Cortical correlates of speech intelligibility measured using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS).

Cortical correlates of speech intelligibility measured using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). Hear Res. 2018 Sep 25;370:53-64 Authors: Lawrence RJ, Wiggins IM, Anderson CA, Davies-Thompson J, Hartley DEH Abstract Functional neuroimaging has identified that the temporal, frontal and parietal cortex support core aspects of speech processing. An objective measure of speech intelligibility based on cortical activation in these brain regions would be extremely useful to speech communication and hearing device applications. In the current study, we used noise-vocoded speech to examine cortical correlates of speech intelligibility in normally-hearing listeners using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), a non-invasive, neuroimaging technique that is fully-compatible with hearing devices, including cochlear implants. In twenty-three normally-hearing adults we measured (1) activation in superior temporal, inferior frontal and inferior parietal cortex bilaterally and (2) behavioural speech intelligibility. Listeners heard noise-vocoded sentences targeting five equally spaced levels of intelligibility between 0 and 100% correct. Activation in superior temporal regions increased linearly with intelligibility. This relationship appears to have been driven in part by changing acoustic properties across stimulation conditions, rather than solely by intelligibility per se. Superior temporal activation was also predictive of in...
Source: Hearing Research - Category: Audiology Authors: Tags: Hear Res Source Type: research