Date on Master's Thesis/Doctoral Dissertation
5-2017
Document Type
Master's Thesis
Degree Name
M.S.
Department
Communicative Disorders
Degree Program
Communicative Disorders, MS
Committee Chair
Pitts, Teresa
Committee Co-Chair (if applicable)
Miller, Sharon
Committee Member
Miller, Sharon
Committee Member
Smith, Alan
Author's Keywords
synthetic speech; EEG; AAC; neural coding; speech perception; natural speech; neural imaging
Abstract
The present study examined whether natural and synthetic speech are differentially encoded in the auditory cortex. Auditory event-related potential (ERP) waveforms were elicited by natural and synthetic fricative-vowel stimuli (/sɑ/ and /ʃɑ/) in a passive listening paradigm in adult listeners with normal hearing. ERP response components were compared across conditions. The results indicated that peak latencies to natural speech were significantly earlier than those to synthetic speech. Natural speech also produced significant electrode hemisphere site effects, whereas synthetic speech activated left, midline, and right electrode hemisphere sites equally. Overall, the results suggest that cortical processing of natural and synthetic speech activates distinct neural systems which has important clinical implications for the speech-language pathology field.
Recommended Citation
Brown, Allison, "Neural coding of natural and synthetic speech." (2017). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. Paper 2648.
https://doi.org/10.18297/etd/2648
