Journal
CEREBRAL CORTEX
Volume 27, Issue 11, Pages 5095-5115Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS INC
DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhw293
Keywords
auditory midbrain; auditory processing; development; neural variability; speech in noise
Categories
Funding
- National Institutes of Health [R01 DC01510, R01 HD069414]
- Knowles Hearing Center
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Auditory-evoked potentials are classically defined as the summations of synchronous firing along the auditory neuraxis. Converging evidence supports a model whereby timing jitter in neural coding compromises listening and causes variable scalp-recorded potentials. Yet the intrinsic noise of human scalp recordings precludes a full understanding of the biological origins of individual differences in listening skills. To delineate the mechanisms contributing to these phenomena, in vivo extracellular activity was recorded from inferior colliculus in guinea pigs to speech in quiet and noise. Here we show that trial-by-trial timing jitter is a mechanism contributing to auditory response variability. Identical variability patterns were observed in scalp recordings in human children, implicating jittered timing as a factor underlying reduced coding of dynamic speech features and speech in noise. Moreover, intertrial variability in human listeners is tied to language development. Together, these findings suggest that variable timing in inferior colliculus blurs the neural coding of speech in noise, and propose a consequence of this timing jitter for human behavior.These results hint both at the mechanisms underlying speech processing in general, and at what may go awry in individuals with listening difficulties.
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