Current Research Studies
Members of the CoNCH Lab study the neural basis of hearing using fMRI and EEG. We are particularly interested in understanding how the brains of listeners transform the noisy and variable sounds of everyday conversations into meaningful language. Our lab focuses on exploring how the brain develops expectations about what it will hear, and how these expectations influence perception.
A large focus of the work in our lab is aimed at better understanding the perception of speech-in-noise. See below to find out more about some current speech in noise studies!
Semantic Ambiguity, Task Effort and Speech-in-Noise Perception
PhD student Jaimy Hannah is interested in how semantic ambiguity impacts the processing of speech-in-noise. Using a behavioural paradigm, she is investigating how the addition of semantic ambiguity affects speech-in-noise intelligibility and how cognitive abilities relate to overcoming these challenges. In collaboration with Dr. Richard Binney at Bangor University, Jaimy is conducting an fMRI study looking at the brain regions recruited by these two challenges. Jaimy is also interested in how the specific demands of a task affect the way we perceive speech-in-noise. Using both EEG and fMRI, she is investigating neural differences in the perception of speech with and without background noise during an intelligibility task compared to a comprehension task.
Cognitive Abilities, Listening Effort and Speech-in-Noise Perception
PhD student Joseph Rovetti is interested in understanding how cognitive abilities, and not just hearing abilities, support speech-in-noise perception. His PhD currently includes three projects. In the first study, a large-scale online experiment, he will use structural equation modelling to assess whether listeners' specific cognitive abilities (e.g., working memory capacity) predict speech-in-noise perception even when accounting for general cognitive ability. In the second, follow-up study, he will assess whether the contributions of cognition vary depending on the type of speech materials used (e.g., sentences vs. narratives). In the third and final study, he will use listeners' cognitive profiles to predict the point at which they begin experiencing listening effort (assessed using self-report and brain imaging measures) and the point at which they lose the gist of what they are listening to.
Another line of work in the lab is aimed at better understanding spatial hearing and organization. See below to find out more about a current spatial hearing study!
Spatial Hearing, Musical Training, and Auditory Perceptual Organization
Our ears constantly receive a blend of sounds from various sources in our surroundings. The auditory system works to organize this blend into a coherent perception of our environment. To accomplish this, our mind employs perceptual rules and utilizes information about different characteristics of sounds, such as their spatial properties (location and movement of sound sources).Research technician Nima Zargarnezhad is interested in exploring 1) the role of spatial information in facilitating the organization of auditory perception, 2) the interaction between spatial information and other sound attributes like frequency in forming the auditory perception, and 3) how musical training alters the impact of spatial information on the organization of auditory perception. To do this Nima is using the Audiodome, a 91 speaker spherical array capable of reproducing highly realistic virtual soundscapes.
Additionally, some members in our lab are also interested in exploring the potential of novel functional-imaging based methods for evaluation of subtle brain abnormalities in epilepsy and other brain disorders.See below to find out more about the Eplink study!
Eplink
Eplink is a large province-wide initiative funded and coordinated by the Ontario Brain Institute (OBI). The purpose of this study is to develop multimodal data that can better identify (1) the seizure focus and (2) the likelihood of cognitive morbidity in patients who will undergo neurosurgery for epilepsy; the aim is better outcomes than the current standard of practice and to 3) find genetic abnormalities in patients with frontal, temporal and insular lobe epilepsy. This may help identify biomarkers that distinguish between good and poor surgical outcomes in epilepsy.
Funding
Research in the CoNCH Lab is currently funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
