Auditory and Higher Order Language Processing
Full course description
The course introduces the auditory and speech system: How do we segregate the sound of a Ferrari from that of a Red Bull Formula 1 car? How do we focus on the voice of a friend among many other voices in a crowd? How do we understand and produce speech? Why does a non-fluent speaker become fluent when his, her or its auditory feedback is delayed? How is auditory information integrated with other senses such as vision or touch?
In the last few years, cognitive neuroscience research has set a number of milestones in our understanding of related brain mechanisms. This knowledge is crucial fundamental knowledge because hearing and communicating with the environment and with others is one of the most essential human cognitive skills. This knowledge helps understanding why something goes wrong (hearing loss, dyslexia, non-fluent speaking). It supports development of interventions.
This course aims to develop students’ knowledge about the human auditory and speech system. The course starts with basic neural anatomy and considers how this might constrain but also assist auditory processing. It provides the basics of auditory Gestalt and stream segregation, speech perception and speech production, and related auditory feedback principles. It introduces how the brain integrates information from different modalities.
Course objectives
Students are able to understand:
- anatomy and function of the auditory system, of the speech system (separately for comprehension and production), and of cross modal integration;
- methods used in CN to study anatomy and function (in animals, humans: electrophysiology, psychophysics, fMRI), understanding relevant aspects of the method to quantify cognition (EEG oscillation, ERP components, fMRI);
- experimental design to study open questions in hearing and speech processing (tasks, stimuli);
- most relevant open issues of how the brains solves problems like Gestalt processing/grouping, figure ground segregation/streaming, comprehension, production, error monitoring, multisensory/cross modal integration;
- acquiring critical thinking skills of limits of methods, designs, tasks and theories in the context of auditory and language processing;
- acquiring creative thinking skills to come with new ideas by merging knowledge from different fields (i.e. comprehension and production, or by transferring ideas from one to another field (speech motor integration and its role in production).