Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Riecke, Lars
• Formisano, Elia
• Sorger, Bettina
• Başkent, Deniz
• Gaudrain, Etienne

Titel

Neural Entrainment to Speech Modulates Speech Intelligibility

Ist Teil von

• Current biology, 2018-01, Vol.28 (2), p.161-169.e5

Ort / Verlag

England: Elsevier Inc

Erscheinungsjahr

2018

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Free E-Journal (出版社公開部分のみ）

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Speech is crucial for communication in everyday life. Speech-brain entrainment, the alignment of neural activity to the slow temporal fluctuations (envelope) of acoustic speech input, is a ubiquitous element of current theories of speech processing. Associations between speech-brain entrainment and acoustic speech signal, listening task, and speech intelligibility have been observed repeatedly. However, a methodological bottleneck has prevented so far clarifying whether speech-brain entrainment contributes functionally to (i.e., causes) speech intelligibility or is merely an epiphenomenon of it. To address this long-standing issue, we experimentally manipulated speech-brain entrainment without concomitant acoustic and task-related variations, using a brain stimulation approach that enables modulating listeners’ neural activity with transcranial currents carrying speech-envelope information. Results from two experiments involving a cocktail-party-like scenario and a listening situation devoid of aural speech-amplitude envelope input reveal consistent effects on listeners’ speech-recognition performance, demonstrating a causal role of speech-brain entrainment in speech intelligibility. Our findings imply that speech-brain entrainment is critical for auditory speech comprehension and suggest that transcranial stimulation with speech-envelope-shaped currents can be utilized to modulate speech comprehension in impaired listening conditions. •Transcranial stimulation with speech-shaped currents influences auditory processing•Speech-brain entrainment modulates speech intelligibility•Speech-brain entrainment and speech intelligibility interact reciprocally Riecke et al. study how humans can recognize speech. Using electric brain stimulation, they find that synchronization of ongoing brain activity with the rhythm of auditory speech modulates the intelligibility of this speech. This implies that the brain can employ its ongoing temporal activity as a critical instrument in speech recognition.