The categorical neural organization of speech aids its perception in noise

We investigated whether the categorical perception (CP) of speech might also provide a mechanism that aids its perception in noise. We varied signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) [clear, 0 dB, -5 dB] while listeners classified an acoustic-phonetic continuum (/u/ to /a/). Noise-related changes in behavioral categorization were only observed at the lowest SNR. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) differentiated phonetic vs. non-phonetic (category ambiguous) speech by the P2 wave (∼180-320 ms). Paralleling behavior, neural responses to speech with clear phonetic status (i.e., continuum endpoints) were largely invariant to noise, whereas responses to ambiguous tokens declined with decreasing SNR. Results demonstrate that phonetic speech representations are more resistant to degradation than corresponding acoustic representations. Findings suggest the mere process of binning speech sounds into categories provides a robust mechanism to aid perception at the “cocktail party” by fortifying abstract categories from the acoustic signal and making the speech code more resistant to external interferences.

• Publication year

  2019

• Venue

  bioRxiv

• Publication date

  2019-05-30

• Fields of study

  Biology, Physics, Psychology

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1101/652842
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

• Linguistic, perceptual, and cognitive factors underlying musicians' benefits in noise-degraded speech perception.

  2019cited by this paper
• Tracing the Trajectory of Sensory Plasticity across Different Stages of Speech Learning in Adulthood.

  2018influential reference
• Brainstem‐cortical functional connectivity for speech is differentially challenged by noise and reverberation

  2018influential reference
• Category learning can alter perception and its neural correlates

  2018influential reference
• The time‐course of cortical responses to speech revealed by fast optical imaging

  2018cited by this paper
• Sonification of scalp-recorded frequency-following responses (FFRs) offers improved response detection over conventional statistical metrics.

  2018cited by this paper
• Training Humans to Categorize Monkey Calls: Auditory Feature- and Category-Selective Neural Tuning Changes.

  2018cited by this paper
• The Frequency-Following Response: A Window into Human Communication

  2017cited by this paper
• Neural Correlates of Speech Segregation Based on Formant Frequencies of Adjacent Vowels

  2017influential reference
• Riparian plant litter quality increases with latitude

  2017cited by this paper
• The effect of integration masking on visual processing in perceptual categorization

  2017influential reference
• Communicating in Challenging Environments: Noise and Reverberation

  2017cited by this paper
• Attentional modulation and domain‐specificity underlying the neural organization of auditory categorical perception

  2017influential reference
• The Role of Categorical Speech Perception and Phonological Processing in Familial Risk Children With and Without Dyslexia.

  2016cited by this paper
• Functional changes in inter- and intra-hemispheric cortical processing underlying degraded speech perception

  2016cited by this paper
• Early-latency categorical speech sound representations in the left inferior frontal gyrus

  2016influential reference
• Is There a Relationship Between Speech Identification in Noise and Categorical Perception in Children With Dyslexia?

  2016influential reference
• Painfree and accurate Bayesian estimation of psychometric functions for (potentially) overdispersed data.

  2016influential reference
• Auditory cortical activity to different voice onset times in cochlear implant users.

  2016cited by this paper
• A database of age-appropriate average MRI templates

  2016cited by this paper
• Individual differences in categorical perception of speech: Cue weighting and executive function

  2016cited by this paper
• Neural Correlates of Auditory Perceptual Awareness and Release from Informational Masking Recorded Directly from Human Cortex: A Case Study

  2016influential reference
• The Categorical Perception Deficit in Dyslexia: A Meta-Analysis

  2015cited by this paper
• Induced neural beta oscillations predict categorical speech perception abilities.

  2015cited by this paper
• Effects of language experience and stimulus context on the neural organization and categorical perception of speech

  2015influential reference
• Hierarchical neurocomputations underlying concurrent sound segregation: connecting periphery to percept.

  2015influential reference
• Musical Training Orchestrates Coordinated Neuroplasticity in Auditory Brainstem and Cortex to Counteract Age-Related Declines in Categorical Vowel Perception

  2015influential reference
• Characterizing the Impact of Category Uncertainty on Human Auditory Categorization Behavior

  2014influential reference
• Functional imaging of auditory scene analysis.

  2014cited by this paper
• Coordinated plasticity in brainstem and auditory cortex contributes to enhanced categorical speech perception in musicians

  2014influential reference
• Categorical speech perception during active discrimination of consonants and vowels.

  2014cited by this paper
• CLARA: classical LORETA analysis recursively applied

  2014cited by this paper
• Age-related changes in the subcortical-cortical encoding and categorical perception of speech.

  2014influential reference
• Automatic Phoneme Category Selectivity in the Dorsal Auditory Stream

  2013cited by this paper
• Age Differences in the Neuroelectric Adaptation to Meaningful Sounds

  2013cited by this paper
• The what, where and how of auditory-object perception

  2013cited by this paper
• Tracing the emergence of categorical speech perception in the human auditory system

  2013influential reference
• Plasticity in neuromagnetic cortical responses suggests enhanced auditory object representation

  2013cited by this paper
• Phoneme and word recognition in the auditory ventral stream

  2012cited by this paper
• Effects of age and background noise on processing a mistuned harmonic in an otherwise periodic complex sound.

  2012cited by this paper
• Effects of Category Learning on Neural Sensitivity to Non-native Phonetic Categories

  2012cited by this paper
• Auditory Cortex Encodes the Perceptual Interpretation of Ambiguous Sound

  2011cited by this paper
• Cortical Dynamics of Acoustic and Phonological Processing in Speech Perception

  2011cited by this paper
• Auditory evoked potentials dissociate rapid perceptual learning from task repetition without learning.

  2011cited by this paper
• Changes in Sensory Evoked Responses Coincide with Rapid Improvement in Speech Identification Performance

  2010cited by this paper
• Effects of reverberation on brainstem representation of speech in musicians and non-musicians.

  2010cited by this paper
• Specialization along the Left Superior Temporal Sulcus for Auditory Categorization

  2010cited by this paper
• Categorical Speech Representation in Human Superior Temporal Gyrus

  2010cited by this paper
• A novel approach for enhancing the signal-to-noise ratio and detecting automatically event-related potentials (ERPs) in single trials

  2010cited by this paper
• Categorical perception.

  2010cited by this paper
• Musician Enhancement for Speech-In-Noise

  2009cited by this paper
• Experience-dependent neural representation of dynamic pitch in the brainstem

  2009cited by this paper
• The Effects of Background Noise on the Neural Responses to Natural Sounds in Cat Primary Auditory Cortex

  2007cited by this paper
• Brain mechanisms implicated in the preattentive categorization of speech sounds revealed using FMRI and a short-interval habituation trial paradigm.

  2007cited by this paper
• Bilinearity, Rules, and Prefrontal Cortex

  2007cited by this paper
• Cue weighting in auditory categorization: implications for first and second language acquisition.

  2006cited by this paper
• Effects of language experience and stimulus complexity on the categorical perception of pitch direction.

  2006cited by this paper
• Perceptual organization of tone sequences in the auditory cortex of awake macaques.

  2005cited by this paper
• Auditory lexical decision, categorical perception, and FM direction discrimination differentially engage left and right auditory cortex.

  2004cited by this paper
• Neural correlates of sensory and decision processes in auditory object identification

  2004influential reference
• Representation of sound categories in auditory cortical maps.

  2004influential reference
• A perceptual interference account of acquisition difficulties for non-native phonemes.

  2003cited by this paper
• Representation of the voice onset time (VOT) speech parameter in population responses within primary auditory cortex of the awake monkey.

  2003cited by this paper
• Advanced Tools for Digital EEG Review:: Virtual Source Montages, Whole-head Mapping, Correlation, and Phase Analysis

  2002cited by this paper
• The five percent electrode system for high-resolution EEG and ERP measurements.

  2001influential reference
• Bottom-up and top-down influences on auditory scene analysis: evidence from event-related brain potentials.

  2001influential reference
• Auditory Cortex Accesses Phonological Categories: An MEG Mismatch Study

  2000cited by this paper
• The correction of ocular artifacts: a topographic perspective.

  2000cited by this paper
• Language deficits in dyslexic children: speech perception, phonology, and morphology.

  2000cited by this paper
• Categorical perception effects induced by category learning.

  1998influential reference
• Categorical Perception Effects Induced by Category Learning

  1998cited by this paper
• Electrophysiological correlates of categorical phoneme perception in adults

  1997cited by this paper
• Speech perception deficits in poor readers: auditory processing or phonological coding?

  1997cited by this paper
• The perceptual magnet effect as an emergent property of neural map formation.

  1996cited by this paper
• Plasticity in the frequency representation of primary auditory cortex following discrimination training in adult owl monkeys

  1993influential reference
• Texture segmentation and pop-out from orientation contrast.

  1991cited by this paper
• Human adults and human infants show a “perceptual magnet effect” for the prototypes of speech categories, monkeys do not

  1991cited by this paper
• Categorical Perception: The Groundwork of Cognition

  1990cited by this paper
• Spherical splines for scalp potential and current density mapping.

  1989cited by this paper
• Contributions of temporal-parietal junction to the human auditory P3.

  1989cited by this paper
• Acoustic-phonetic representations in word recognition.

  1987cited by this paper
• Speech perception in severely disabled and average reading children.

  1987influential reference
• Reaction times to comparisons within and across phonetic categories

  1974cited by this paper
• Auditory and phonetic memory codes in the discrimination of consonants and vowels

  1973cited by this paper
• The assessment and analysis of handedness: the Edinburgh inventory.

  1971influential reference
• Perception of the speech code.

  1967cited by this paper
• Subject Collections

  year unknowncited by this paper
• American Psychological Association, Inc. Evaluation and Integration of Visual and Auditory Information in Speech Perception

  year unknowncited by this paper

• Autonomic Nervous System Correlates of Speech Categorization Revealed Through Pupillometry

  2020cites this paper
• Plasticity in auditory categorization is supported by differential engagement of the auditory-linguistic network

  2019cites this paper
• Mentoring Undergraduate Students

  2017cites this paper