Predictive processing increases intelligibility of acoustically distorted speech: Behavioral and neural correlates

Hakonen, Maria; May, Patrick; Jä̈askëlainen, Iiro P.; Jokinen, Emma; Sams, Mikko; Tiitinen, Hannu

doi:10.1002/brb3.789

Cited by 10 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 69 publications

(143 reference statements)

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“…Our third goal was to establish a sensitive metric of measurement of language comprehension which considers the use of context by listeners. We note the caveat in the measurement of language comprehension in above-mentioned studies (e.g., Sheldon et al, 2008;Erb et al, 2013;Hakonen et al, 2017) and extend it further with a metric that we consider is a better measure of language comprehension (Amichetti et al, 2018) in the write-down paradigm (Samar and Metz, 1988).…”

Section: Goals Of This Studymentioning

confidence: 69%

“…The measurement of comprehension performance is inconsistent across studies. For instance, Erb et al (2013) and Hakonen et al (2017) measured participants’ performance as proportion of correctly reported words per sentence (“report scores”; Peelle et al, 2013 ). On the other hand, Sheldon et al (2008) asked participants to only report the final word of the sentence and then calculated the proportion of correctly reported words.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Semantic Predictability Facilitates Comprehension of Degraded Speech in a Graded Manner

2021

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Previous studies have shown that at moderate levels of spectral degradation, semantic predictability facilitates language comprehension. It is argued that when speech is degraded, listeners have narrowed expectations about the sentence endings; i.e., semantic prediction may be limited to only most highly predictable sentence completions. The main objectives of this study were to (i) examine whether listeners form narrowed expectations or whether they form predictions across a wide range of probable sentence endings, (ii) assess whether the facilitatory effect of semantic predictability is modulated by perceptual adaptation to degraded speech, and (iii) use and establish a sensitive metric for the measurement of language comprehension. For this, we created 360 German Subject-Verb-Object sentences that varied in semantic predictability of a sentence-final target word in a graded manner (high, medium, and low) and levels of spectral degradation (1, 4, 6, and 8 channels noise-vocoding). These sentences were presented auditorily to two groups: One group (n =48) performed a listening task in an unpredictable channel context in which the degraded speech levels were randomized, while the other group (n =50) performed the task in a predictable channel context in which the degraded speech levels were blocked. The results showed that at 4 channels noise-vocoding, response accuracy was higher in high-predictability sentences than in the medium-predictability sentences, which in turn was higher than in the low-predictability sentences. This suggests that, in contrast to the narrowed expectations view, comprehension of moderately degraded speech, ranging from low- to high- including medium-predictability sentences, is facilitated in a graded manner; listeners probabilistically preactivate upcoming words from a wide range of semantic space, not limiting only to highly probable sentence endings. Additionally, in both channel contexts, we did not observe learning effects; i.e., response accuracy did not increase over the course of experiment, and response accuracy was higher in the predictable than in the unpredictable channel context. We speculate from these observations that when there is no trial-by-trial variation of the levels of speech degradation, listeners adapt to speech quality at a long timescale; however, when there is a trial-by-trial variation of the high-level semantic feature (e.g., sentence predictability), listeners do not adapt to low-level perceptual property (e.g., speech quality) at a short timescale.

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Section: Goals Of This Studymentioning

confidence: 69%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Semantic Predictability Facilitates Comprehension of Degraded Speech in a Graded Manner

2021

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“…For studies with auditory stimulus presentation, we identified all contrasts of sentences against an unintelligible auditory baseline (as in Adank, ): white noise, reversed speech, speech‐envelope noise, tones, signal correlated noise, hummed sentences, low‐pass filtered speech (preserving only an intonational contour, thus unintelligible), and noise vocoded speech. Note that noise‐vocoded speech can be intelligible if coded with more than four channels (Davis, Johnsrude, Hervais‐Adelman, Taylor, & McGettigan, ), or when preceded by intelligible versions of the same sentence (Hakonen et al, ). We therefore, only included contrasts with noise‐vocoded speech as the baseline where it was encoded with four or fewer channels, where it was not preceded by a more intelligible version of the same sentence, and where it was reported to be unintelligible.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural networks for sentence comprehension and production: An ALE‐based meta‐analysis of neuroimaging studies

Walenski

Europa

Caplan

et al. 2019

Human Brain Mapping

118

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Comprehending and producing sentences is a complex endeavor requiring the coordinated activity of multiple brain regions. We examined three issues related to the brain networks underlying sentence comprehension and production in healthy individuals: First, which regions are recruited for sentence comprehension and sentence production? Second, are there differences for auditory sentence comprehension vs. visual sentence comprehension? Third, which regions are specifically recruited for the comprehension of syntactically complex sentences? Results from activation likelihood estimation (ALE) analyses (from 45 studies) implicated a sentence comprehension network occupying bilateral frontal and temporal lobe regions. Regions implicated in production (from 15 studies) overlapped with the set of regions associated with sentence comprehension in the left hemisphere, but did not include inferior frontal cortex, and did not extend to the right hemisphere. Modality differences between auditory and visual sentence comprehension were found principally in the temporal lobes. Results from the analysis of complex syntax (from 37 studies) showed engagement of left inferior frontal and posterior temporal regions, as well as the right insula. The involvement of the right hemisphere in the comprehension of these structures has potentially important implications for language treatment and recovery in individuals with agrammatic aphasia following left hemisphere brain damage.

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“…From this perspective, object recognition is a matching task. An analogy representing the closest familiar representation in memory is selected by the prefrontal cortex from a matrix of possibilities with differing probabilities (Hakonen et al, 2017). Low probability analogies are suppressed (Depue, 2012).…”

Section: Perceptual Inference-cycles Of Searching the World And Searcmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The preceding example of prediction error minimization occurs over time with repeated sets of subjective reports followed by sets of eye movements. Presumably this involves cycles of re-entrant processing as information gets passed through thalamo-cortical as well as cortico-cortico loops as the processes of disambiguation, differentiation, sensory integration, and mnemonic integration occur (Edelman and Gally, 2013; Preston and Eichenbaum, 2013; Ohkawa et al, 2015; Richter et al, 2015; Hakonen et al, 2017; Kitamura et al, 2017; Yokose et al, 2017; Chao et al, 2018). The result is an updated memory and model of the world that makes better predictions.…”

Section: Re-entrant Processingmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Predictive Processing Model of EMDR

Chamberlin¹

2019

Front. Psychol.

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Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing Therapy (EMDR) is an effective treatment for Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The Adaptive Information Processing Model (AIP) guides the development and practice of EMDR. The AIP postulates inadequately processed memory as the foundation of PTSD pathology. Predictive Processing postulates that the primary function of the brain is prediction that serves to anticipate the next moment of experience in order to resist the dissipative force of entropy thus facilitating continued survival. Memory is the primary substrate of prediction, and is optimized by an ongoing process of precision weighted prediction error minimization that refines prediction by updating the memories on which it is based. The Predictive Processing model of EMDR postulates that EMDR facilitates the predictive processing of traumatic memory by overcoming the bias against exploration and evidence accumulation. The EMDR protocol brings the traumatic memory into an active state of re-experiencing. Defensive responding and/or low sensory precision preclude evidence accumulation to test the predictions of the traumatic memory in the present. Sets of therapist guided eye movements repeatedly challenge the bias against evidence accumulation and compel sensory sampling of the benign present. Eye movements reset the theta rhythm organizing the flow of information through the brain, facilitating the deployment of both overt and covert attention, and the mnemonic search for associations. Sampling of sensation does not support the predictions of the traumatic memory resulting in prediction error that the brain then attempts to minimize. The net result is a restoration of the integrity of the rhythmic deployment of attention, a recalibration of sensory precision, and the updating (reconsolidation) of the traumatic memory. Thus one prediction of the model is a decrease in Attention Bias Variability, a core dysfunction in PTSD, following successful treatment with EMDR.

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Predictive processing increases intelligibility of acoustically distorted speech: Behavioral and neural correlates

Cited by 10 publications

References 69 publications

Semantic Predictability Facilitates Comprehension of Degraded Speech in a Graded Manner

Semantic Predictability Facilitates Comprehension of Degraded Speech in a Graded Manner

Neural networks for sentence comprehension and production: An ALE‐based meta‐analysis of neuroimaging studies

The Predictive Processing Model of EMDR

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