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Conscious and unconscious contributions to auditory feedback control of speech — Neural correlates and behavioral effects
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Poster E68 in Poster Session E, Thursday, October 26, 10:15 am - 12:00 pm CEST, Espace Vieux-Port
Henry Railo1, Daniel Daniel Suchý1, Roozbeh Behroozmand2; 1University of Turku, 2University of South Carolina
Motor control of speech strongly relies on auditory feedback. While efficient auditory feedback control of speech likely builds on unconscious processes, sometimes individuals need to consciously monitor and adjust their speech. However, the role and neural correlates of conscious auditory feedback control of speech remains open. Auditory feedback control of speech can be studied experimentally by exposing individuals to altered (i.e., “perturbed”) real-time auditory feedback. In this pre-registered study, we exposed participants (N = 30) to individually calibrated perceptual threshold-level pitch perturbations. This allowed us to vary the participants’ conscious perception of the altered auditory feedback while keeping physical stimulation (i.e., the size of the pitch perturbation) constant. We tested 1) how conscious perception of the perturbation modifies vocal responses to the perturbation, and using event-related potentials, 2) examined which electrophysiological processes correlate with conscious perception of the perturbed auditory feedback. We observed that the early part of the vocal response to the perturbation was mediated by unconscious processes. Reported conscious perception of the perturbation modified vocal responses during later time-windows (500–700 ms). Conscious perception of the altered auditory feedback correlated with event-related potentials (ERPs) in two time-windows, roughly between 100–200 ms, and 300–500 ms after perturbation onset. Consistent with some models of speech motor control, both of the correlates were right-lateralized. The results indicate that auditory feedback control of vocalization is mediated by both unconscious and conscious perceptual processes. While the ERP results suggest that perturbations to auditory feedback gain rapid access to conscious perception through right-lateralized neural circuitry, additional processing time is needed to modify vocalization based on conscious perception. Our results help integrate models of speech feedback motor control, and models of auditory perception.
Topic Areas: Speech Motor Control, Speech Perception