Matching Items (15)
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- All Subjects: Audiology
- All Subjects: working memory
- Creators: Azuma, Tamiko
- Creators: Daliri, Ayoub
Description
Frequency effects favoring high print-frequency words have been observed in frequency judgment memory tasks. Healthy young adults performed frequency judgment tasks; one group performed a single task while another group did the same task while alternating their attention to a secondary task (mathematical equations). Performance was assessed by correct and error responses, reaction times, and accuracy. Accuracy and reaction times were analyzed in terms of memory load (task condition), number of repetitions, effect of high vs. low print-frequency, and correlations with working memory span. Multinomial tree analyses were also completed to investigate source vs. item memory and revealed a mirror effect in episodic memory experiments (source memory), but a frequency advantage in span tasks (item memory). Interestingly enough, we did not observe an advantage for high working memory span individuals in frequency judgments, even when participants split their attention during the dual task (similar to a complex span task). However, we concluded that both the amount of attentional resources allocated and prior experience with an item affect how it is stored in memory.
ContributorsPeterson, Megan Paige (Author) / Azuma, Tamiko (Thesis advisor) / Gray, Shelley (Committee member) / Liss, Julie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
Distorted vowel production is a hallmark characteristic of dysarthric speech, irrespective of the underlying neurological condition or dysarthria diagnosis. A variety of acoustic metrics have been used to study the nature of vowel production deficits in dysarthria; however, not all demonstrate sensitivity to the exhibited deficits. Less attention has been paid to quantifying the vowel production deficits associated with the specific dysarthrias. Attempts to characterize the relationship between naturally degraded vowel production in dysarthria with overall intelligibility have met with mixed results, leading some to question the nature of this relationship. It has been suggested that aberrant vowel acoustics may be an index of overall severity of the impairment and not an "integral component" of the intelligibility deficit. A limitation of previous work detailing perceptual consequences of disordered vowel acoustics is that overall intelligibility, not vowel identification accuracy, has been the perceptual measure of interest. A series of three experiments were conducted to address the problems outlined herein. The goals of the first experiment were to identify subsets of vowel metrics that reliably distinguish speakers with dysarthria from non-disordered speakers and differentiate the dysarthria subtypes. Vowel metrics that capture vowel centralization and reduced spectral distinctiveness among vowels differentiated dysarthric from non-disordered speakers. Vowel metrics generally failed to differentiate speakers according to their dysarthria diagnosis. The second and third experiments were conducted to evaluate the relationship between degraded vowel acoustics and the resulting percept. In the second experiment, correlation and regression analyses revealed vowel metrics that capture vowel centralization and distinctiveness and movement of the second formant frequency were most predictive of vowel identification accuracy and overall intelligibility. The third experiment was conducted to evaluate the extent to which the nature of the acoustic degradation predicts the resulting percept. Results suggest distinctive vowel tokens are better identified and, likewise, better-identified tokens are more distinctive. Further, an above-chance level agreement between nature of vowel misclassification and misidentification errors was demonstrated for all vowels, suggesting degraded vowel acoustics are not merely an index of severity in dysarthria, but rather are an integral component of the resultant intelligibility disorder.
ContributorsLansford, Kaitlin L (Author) / Liss, Julie M (Thesis advisor) / Dorman, Michael F. (Committee member) / Azuma, Tamiko (Committee member) / Lotto, Andrew J (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Otoacoustic emissions (OAEs) are soft sounds generated by the inner ear and can be recorded within the ear canal. Since OAEs can reflect the functional status of the inner ear, OAE measurements have been widely used for hearing loss screening in the clinic. However, there are limitations in current clinical OAE measurements, such as the restricted frequency range, low efficiency and inaccurate calibration. In this dissertation project, a new method of OAE measurement which used a swept tone to evoke the stimulus frequency OAEs (SFOAEs) was developed to overcome the limitations of current methods. In addition, an in-situ calibration was applied to equalize the spectral level of the swept-tone stimulus at the tympanic membrane (TM). With this method, SFOAEs could be recorded with high resolution over a wide frequency range within one or two minutes. Two experiments were conducted to verify the accuracy of the in-situ calibration and to test the performance of the swept-tone SFOAEs. In experiment I, the calibration of the TM sound pressure was verified in both acoustic cavities and real ears by using a second probe microphone. In addition, the benefits of the in-situ calibration were investigated by measuring OAEs under different calibration conditions. Results showed that the TM pressure could be predicted correctly, and the in-situ calibration provided the most reliable results in OAE measurements. In experiment II, a three-interval paradigm with a tracking-filter technique was used to record the swept-tone SFOAEs in 20 normal-hearing subjects. The test-retest reliability of the swept-tone SFOAEs was examined using a repeated-measure design under various stimulus levels and durations. The accuracy of the swept-tone method was evaluated by comparisons with a standard method using discrete pure tones. Results showed that SFOAEs could be reliably and accurately measured with the swept-tone method. Comparing with the pure-tone approach, the swept-tone method showed significantly improved efficiency. The swept-tone SFOAEs with in-situ calibration may be an alternative of current clinical OAE measurements for more detailed evaluation of inner ear function and accurate diagnosis.
ContributorsChen, Shixiong (Author) / Bian, Lin (Thesis advisor) / Yost, William (Committee member) / Azuma, Tamiko (Committee member) / Dorman, Michael (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
In this study, the Bark transform and Lobanov method were used to normalize vowel formants in speech produced by persons with dysarthria. The computer classification accuracy of these normalized data were then compared to the results of human perceptual classification accuracy of the actual vowels. These results were then analyzed to determine if these techniques correlated with the human data.
ContributorsJones, Hanna Vanessa (Author) / Liss, Julie (Thesis director) / Dorman, Michael (Committee member) / Borrie, Stephanie (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Speech and Hearing Science (Contributor) / Department of English (Contributor) / Speech and Hearing Science (Contributor)
Created2013-05
Description
Past studies have shown that auditory feedback plays an important role in maintaining the speech production system. Typically, speakers compensate for auditory feedback alterations when the alterations persist over time (auditory motor adaptation). Our study focused on how to increase the rate of adaptation by using different auditory feedback conditions. For the present study, we recruited a total of 30 participants. We examined auditory motor adaptation after participants completed three conditions: Normal speaking, noise-masked speaking, and silent reading. The normal condition was used as a control condition. In the noise-masked condition, noise was added to the auditory feedback to completely mask speech outputs. In the silent reading condition, participants were instructed to silently read target words in their heads, then read the words out loud. We found that the learning rate in the noise-masked condition was lower than that in the normal condition. In contrast, participants adapted at a faster rate after they experience the silent reading condition. Overall, this study demonstrated that adaptation rate can be modified through pre-exposing participants to different types auditory-motor manipulations.
ContributorsNavarrete, Karina (Author) / Daliri, Ayoub (Thesis director) / Peter, Beate (Committee member) / College of Health Solutions (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-05
Description
Purpose: Children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have been found to have central executive deficits in working memory as well as less academic success than children with typical development. The purpose of this study was to determine which components of central executive function were most closely related to parental rating scores of attention.
Method: Two hundred twenty three 2nd graders with typical development, dyslexia, developmental language disorder (DLD), or dyslexia/DLD completed three central executive tasks from the Comprehensive Assessment Battery for Children–Working Memory (Gray, Alt, Hogan, Green, & Cowan, n.d.). Parents of the children completed the ADHD Rating Scale-IV: Home Version for their child. None of the participants had been diagnosed with ADD/ADHD
Results: When diagnostic group performance was compared we found significant differences on each central executive task. When ADHD group performance was compared we found a significant between-group performance only on the n-back visual task with the high-risk group scoring lower than the other two groups. ADHD rating scores predicted a significant amount of variance for each central executive task, but percentages were small (3%-6%).
Discussion: Working memory is known to be related to attention control. Stronger attentional control is associated with a higher working memory performance. Our study showed that children most at risk for ADD/ADHD based on parent ratings scored lowest on the visuospatial task, likely because rehearsal of visuospatial information is not possible so relies more heavily on attention. This study is a step toward considering how attention affects working memory performance so that both can be considered when designing instruction and interventions.
Method: Two hundred twenty three 2nd graders with typical development, dyslexia, developmental language disorder (DLD), or dyslexia/DLD completed three central executive tasks from the Comprehensive Assessment Battery for Children–Working Memory (Gray, Alt, Hogan, Green, & Cowan, n.d.). Parents of the children completed the ADHD Rating Scale-IV: Home Version for their child. None of the participants had been diagnosed with ADD/ADHD
Results: When diagnostic group performance was compared we found significant differences on each central executive task. When ADHD group performance was compared we found a significant between-group performance only on the n-back visual task with the high-risk group scoring lower than the other two groups. ADHD rating scores predicted a significant amount of variance for each central executive task, but percentages were small (3%-6%).
Discussion: Working memory is known to be related to attention control. Stronger attentional control is associated with a higher working memory performance. Our study showed that children most at risk for ADD/ADHD based on parent ratings scored lowest on the visuospatial task, likely because rehearsal of visuospatial information is not possible so relies more heavily on attention. This study is a step toward considering how attention affects working memory performance so that both can be considered when designing instruction and interventions.
ContributorsCleveland, Alexandra (Author) / Gray, Shelley (Thesis director) / Azuma, Tamiko (Committee member) / College of Health Solutions (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-12
Description
An increasing number of veterans are transitioning from military service to college. Critical to academic success is the process of decision-making, which previous research has found to be influenced by a variety of factors including anxiety and working memory (WM). Many service-related conditions often influence anxiety and WM, and given the high prevalence of these conditions among veterans, the present study aimed to analyze the effects of working memory and anxiety on decision-making behavior in U.S. Military Veterans. Participants completed a large test battery including tasks assessing WM skills (Symmetry Span Task), anxiety (Beck Anxiety Inventory), and decision-making (Iowa Gambling Task). The study results indicated that WM and anxiety both play roles in decision-making performance in young military veterans. High anxiety is related to increased avoidance of adverse outcomes in decision-making for U.S. Military Veterans, while lower working memory span is associated with greater risk-taking behavior. This study provides both functional and clinical implications into areas of possible intervention that need to be assessed in military veterans, as well as modifications to these assessments that need to be made in order to appropriately measure decision-making behavior. Future work will be done in order to more effectively analyze the adverse impacts of service-related conditions and the ways in which intervention can be implemented in order to minimize these effects.
ContributorsTully, Mckayla Lynne (Author) / Azuma, Tamiko (Thesis director) / Gallagher, Karen (Committee member) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics (Contributor) / Department of Speech and Hearing Science (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
Working memory and cognitive functions contribute to speech recognition in normal hearing and hearing impaired listeners. In this study, auditory and cognitive functions are measured in young adult normal hearing, elderly normal hearing, and elderly cochlear implant subjects. The effects of age and hearing on the different measures are investigated. The correlations between auditory/cognitive functions and speech/music recognition are examined. The results may demonstrate which factors can better explain the variable performance across elderly cochlear implant users.
ContributorsKolberg, Courtney Elizabeth (Author) / Luo, Xin (Thesis director) / Azuma, Tamiko (Committee member) / Department of Speech and Hearing Science (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
Pitch and timbre perception are two important dimensions of auditory perception. These aspects of sound aid the understanding of our environment, and contribute to normal everyday functioning. It is therefore important to determine the nature of perceptual interaction between these two dimensions of sound. This study tested the interactions between pitch perception associated with the fundamental frequency (F0) and sharpness perception associated with the spectral slope of harmonic complex tones in normal hearing (NH) listeners and cochlear implant (CI) users. Pitch and sharpness ranking was measured without changes in the non-target dimension (Experiment 1), with different amounts of unrelated changes in the non-target dimension (Experiment 2), and with congruent/incongruent changes of similar perceptual salience in the non-target dimension (Experiment 3). The results showed that CI users had significantly worse pitch and sharpness ranking thresholds than NH listeners. Pitch and sharpness perception had symmetric interactions in NH listeners. However, for CI users, spectral slope changes significantly affected pitch ranking, while F0 changes had no significant effect on sharpness ranking. CI users' pitch ranking sensitivity was significantly better with congruent than with incongruent spectral slope changes. These results have important implications for CI processing strategies to better transmit pitch and timbre cues to CI users.
ContributorsSoslowsky, Samara Miranda (Author) / Luo, Xin (Thesis director) / Yost, William (Committee member) / Dorman, Michael (Committee member) / Department of Speech and Hearing Science (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
Speech and music are traditionally thought to be primarily supported by different hemispheres. A growing body of evidence suggests that speech and music often rely on shared resources in bilateral brain networks, though the right and left hemispheres exhibit some domain-specific specialization. While there is ample research investigating speech deficits in individuals with right hemisphere lesions and amusia, fewer investigate amusia in individuals with left hemisphere lesions and aphasia. Many of the fronto-temporal-parietal regions in the left hemisphere commonly associated with speech processing and production are also implicated in bilateral music processing networks. The current study investigates the relationship between damage to specific regions of interest within these networks, and an individual’s ability to successfully match the pitch and rhythm of a presented melody. Twenty-seven participants with chronic-stroke lesions were given a melody repetition task to hum short novel piano melodies. Participants underwent structural MRI acquisition and were administered an extensive speech and cognitive battery. Pitch and rhythm scores were calculated by correlating participant responses and target piano notes. Production errors were calculated by counting trials with responses that don’t match the target melody’s note count. Overall, performance varied widely, and rhythm scores were significantly correlated. Working memory scores were significantly correlated with rhythm scores and production errors, but not pitch scores. Broca’s area lesions were not associated with significant differences in any of the melody repetition measures, while left Heschl’s gyrus lesions were associated with worse performance on pitch, rhythm, and production errors. Lower rhythm scores were associated with lesions including both the left anterior and posterior superior temporal gyrus, and in participants with damage to the left planum temporale. The other regions of interest were not consistently associated with poorer pitch scores or production errors. Although the present study does have limitations, the current study suggests lesions to left hemisphere regions thought to only affect speech also affect musical pitch and rhythm processing. Therefore, amusia should not be characterized solely as a right hemisphere disorder. Instead, musical abilities of individuals with left hemisphere stroke and aphasia should be characterized to better understand their deficits and mechanisms of impairment.
ContributorsWojtaszek, Mallory (Author) / Rogalsky, Corianne (Thesis advisor) / Daliri, Ayoub (Committee member) / Patten, Kristopher (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022