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The ability to generalize across specific experiences is vital for the recognition of new patterns, especially in speech perception considering acoustic–phonetic pattern variability. Indeed, behavioral research has demonstrated that listeners are able via a process of generalized learning to leverage their experiences of past words said by difficult-to-understand talker to improve their understanding for new words said by that talker. Here, we examine differences in neural responses to generalized versus rote learning in auditory cortical processing by training listeners to understand a novel synthetic talker. Using a pretest–posttest design with EEG, participants were trained using either (1) a large inventory of words where no words were repeated across the experiment (generalized learning) or (2) a small inventory of words where words were repeated (rote learning). Analysis of long-latency auditory evoked potentials at pretest and posttest revealed that rote and generalized learning both produced rapid changes in auditory processing, yet the nature of these changes differed. Generalized learning was marked by an amplitude reduction in the N1–P2 complex and by the presence of a late negativity wave in the auditory evoked potential following training; rote learning was marked only by temporally later scalp topography differences. The early N1–P2 change, found only for generalized learning, is consistent with an active processing account of speech perception, which proposes that the ability to rapidly adjust to the specific vocal characteristics of a new talker (for which rote learning is rare) relies on attentional mechanisms to selectively modify early auditory processing sensitivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most individuals have reliable long-term memories for the pitch of familiar music recordings. This pitch memory (1) appears to be normally distributed in the population, (2) does not depend on explicit musical training and (3) only seems to be weakly related to differences in listening frequency estimates. The present experiment was designed to assess whether individual differences in auditory working memory could explain variance in long-term pitch memory for music recordings. In Experiment 1, participants first completed a musical note adjustment task that has been previously used to assess working memory of musical pitch. Afterward, participants were asked to judge the pitch of well-known music recordings, which either had or had not been shifted in pitch. We found that performance on the pitch working memory task was significantly related to performance in the pitch memory task using well-known recordings, even when controlling for overall musical experience and familiarity with each recording. In Experiment 2, we replicated these findings in a separate group of participants while additionally controlling for fluid intelligence and non-pitch-based components of auditory working memory. In Experiment 3, we demonstrated that participants could not accurately judge the pitch of unfamiliar recordings, suggesting that our method of pitch shifting did not result in unwanted acoustic cues that could have aided participants in Experiments 1 and 2. These results, taken together, suggest that the ability to maintain pitch information in working memory might lead to more accurate long-term pitch memory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on auditory perception often starts from an assumed theoretical framework of bottom-up acoustic signal decoding followed by pattern matching of signal information to memory. Some specific forms of auditory perception such as speech perception are often assumed to be mediated by specialized mechanisms, shaped by evolution to address the challenges of speech perception. However, neither of these broad approaches conceives of these systems as intrinsically adaptable and plastic; learning is typically considered as a separate process. This chapter addresses the question of auditory perceptual understanding and plasticity and argues that auditory perception, including speech perception, is an active cognitive process that incorporates learning. In contrast to a passive process in which patterns are mapped into memory in a direct comparative process, an active process forms hypotheses about pattern identity, and tests these hypotheses to adaptively shift attention to aspects of signal information. The process of hypothesis testing for signal understanding comes into play in cases of signal ambiguity or uncertainty, and involves auditory working memory and the control of attention. This conceptualization of adaptive processing incorporates context-sensitive change into the perceptual system. We argue that perception should be viewed not as a fixed instrument of information reception, but as a dynamic, adaptive system that is changed by the act of perception. We present evidence for these claims, outline a framework for a theory of active auditory perception, and argue further against claims of critical periods as biological determinism for perceptual plasticity given that auditory perception is auditory learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A change in talker is a change in the context for the phonetic interpretation of acoustic patterns of speech. Different talkers have different mappings between acoustic patterns and phonetic categories and listeners need to adapt to these differences. Despite this complexity, listeners are adept at comprehending speech in multiple-talker contexts, albeit at a slight but measurable performance cost (e.g., slower recognition). So far, this talker-variability cost has been demonstrated only in audio-only speech. Other research in single-talker contexts have shown, however, that when listeners are able to see a talker's face, speech recognition is improved under adverse listening (e.g., noise or distortion) conditions that can increase uncertainty in the mapping between acoustic patterns and phonetic categories. Does seeing a talker's face reduce the cost of word recognition in multiple-talker contexts? We used a speeded word-monitoring task in which listeners make quick judgments about target-word recognition in single- and multiple-talker contexts. Results show faster recognition performance in single-talker conditions compared to multiple-talker conditions for both audio-only and audio-visual speech. However, recognition time in a multiple-talker context was slower in the audio-visual condition compared to audio-only condition. These results suggest that seeing a talker's face during speech perception may slow recognition by increasing the importance of talker identification, signaling to the listener a change in talker has occurred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Absolute pitch (AP) is the rare ability to name any musical note without the use of a reference note. Given that genuine AP representations are based on the identification of isolated notes by their tone chroma, they are considered to be invariant to (1) surrounding tonal context, (2) changes in instrumental timbre, and (3) changes in octave register. However, there is considerable variability in the literature in terms of how AP is trained and tested along these dimensions, making recent claims about AP learning difficult to assess. Here, we examined the effect of tonal context on participant success with a single-note identification training paradigm, including how learning generalized to an untested instrument and octave. We found that participants were able to rapidly learn to distinguish C from other notes, with and without feedback and regardless of the tonal context in which C was presented. Participants were also able to partly generalize this skill to an untrained instrument. However, participants displayed the weakest generalization in recognizing C in a higher octave. The results indicate that participants were likely attending to pitch height in addition to pitch chroma - a conjecture that was supported by analyzing the pattern of response errors. These findings highlight the complex nature of note representation in AP, which requires note identification across contexts, going beyond the simple storage of a note fundamental. The importance of standardizing testing that spans both timbre and octave in assessing AP and further implications on past literature and future work are discussed., (© 2023. The Psychonomic Society, Inc.)

Adjusting to the vocal characteristics of a new talker is important for speech recognition. Previous research has indicated that adjusting to talker differences is an active cognitive process that depends on attention and working memory (WM). These studies have not examined how talker variability affects perception and neural responses in fluent speech. Here we use source analysis from high-density EEG to show that perceiving fluent speech in which the talker changes recruits early involvement of parietal and temporal cortical areas, suggesting functional involvement of WM and attention in talker normalization. We extend these findings to acoustic source change in general by examining understanding environmental sounds in spoken sentence context. Though there may be differences in cortical recruitment to processing demands for non-speech sounds versus a changing talker, the underlying mechanisms are similar, supporting the view that shared cognitive-general mechanisms assist both talker normalization and speech-to-nonspeech transitions., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Environmental sounds (ES) can be understood easily when substituted for words in sentences, suggesting that linguistic context benefits may be mediated by processes more general than some language-specific theories assert. However, the underlying neural processing is not understood. EEG was recorded for spoken sentences ending in either a spoken word or a corresponding ES. Endings were either congruent or incongruent with the sentence frame, and thus were expected to produce N400 activity. However, if ES and word meanings are combined with language context by different mechanisms, different N400 responses would be expected. Incongruent endings (both words and ES) elicited frontocentral negativities corresponding to the N400 typically observed to incongruent spoken words. Moreover, sentential constraint had similar effects on N400 topographies to ES and words. Comparison of speech and ES responses suggests that understanding meaning in speech context may be mediated by similar neural mechanisms for these two types of stimuli., (Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

There is debate about how individuals use context to successfully predict and recognize words. One view argues that context supports neural predictions that make use of the speech motor system, whereas other views argue for a sensory or conceptual level of prediction. While environmental sounds can convey clear referential meaning, they are not linguistic signals, and are thus neither produced with the vocal tract nor typically encountered in sentence context. We compared the effect of spoken sentence context on recognition and comprehension of spoken words versus nonspeech, environmental sounds. In Experiment 1, sentence context decreased the amount of signal needed for recognition of spoken words and environmental sounds in similar fashion. In Experiment 2, listeners judged sentence meaning in both high and low contextually constraining sentence frames, when the final word was present or replaced with a matching environmental sound. Results showed that sentence constraint affected decision time similarly for speech and nonspeech, such that high constraint sentences (i.e., frame plus completion) were processed faster than low constraint sentences for speech and nonspeech. Linguistic context facilitates the recognition and understanding of nonspeech sounds in much the same way as for spoken words. This argues against a simple form of a speech-motor explanation of predictive coding in spoken language understanding, and suggests support for conceptual-level predictions., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Many individuals are able to perceive when the tuning of familiar stimuli, such as popular music recordings, has been altered. This suggests a kind of ubiquitous pitch memory, though it is unclear how this ability differs across individuals with and without absolute pitch (AP) and whether it plays any role in AP. In the present study, we take advantage of a salient single frequency - the 1000Hz sine tone used to censor taboo words in broadcast media - to assess the nature of this kind of pitch memory across individuals with and without AP. We show that non-AP participants are accurate at selecting the correct version of the censor tone among incorrect versions shifted by either one or two semitones, though their accuracy was still below that of an AP population (Experiment 1). This suggests a benefit for AP listeners that could be due to the use of explicit note categories or greater amounts of musical training. However, AP possessors still outperformed all non-AP participants when incorrect versions of the censor tone were shifted within a note category, even when controlling for musical experience (Experiment 2). Experiment 3 demonstrated that AP listeners did not appear to possess a category label for the censor tone that could have helped them differentiate the censor tones used in Experiment 2. Overall, these results suggest that AP possessors may have better pitch memory, even when divorced from pitch labeling (note categories). As such, these results have implications for how AP may develop and be maintained., (Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Absolute pitch (AP) is typically defined as the ability to label an isolated tone as a musical note in the absence of a reference tone. At first glance the acquisition of AP note categories seems like a perceptual learning task, since individuals must assign a category label to a stimulus based on a single perceptual dimension (pitch) while ignoring other perceptual dimensions (e.g., loudness, octave, instrument). AP, however, is rarely discussed in terms of domain-general perceptual learning mechanisms. This is because AP is typically assumed to depend on a critical period of development, in which early exposure to pitches and musical labels is thought to be necessary for the development of AP precluding the possibility of adult acquisition of AP. Despite this view of AP, several previous studies have found evidence that absolute pitch category learning is, to an extent, trainable in a post-critical period adult population, even if the performance typically achieved by this population is below the performance of a "true" AP possessor. The current studies attempt to understand the individual differences in learning to categorize notes using absolute pitch cues by testing a specific prediction regarding cognitive capacity related to categorization - to what extent does an individual's general auditory working memory capacity (WMC) predict the success of absolute pitch category acquisition. Since WMC has been shown to predict performance on a wide variety of other perceptual and category learning tasks, we predict that individuals with higher WMC should be better at learning absolute pitch note categories than individuals with lower WMC. Across two studies, we demonstrate that auditory WMC predicts the efficacy of learning absolute pitch note categories. These results suggest that a higher general auditory WMC might underlie the formation of absolute pitch categories for post-critical period adults. Implications for understanding the mechanisms that underlie the phenomenon of AP are also discussed., (Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier B.V.)