Auditory evoked potentials during multichannel selective listening: Role of pitch and localization cues.

Abstract

Auditory evoked potentials were recorded from subjects who listened selectively to tone pips arriving over one of three input channels. Their task was to detect occasional target tones of a slightly longer duration. In different runs the three channels were distinguished from one another by (a) pitch cues alone (800, 1,800, and 2,800 Hz), (b) localization cues alone (right ear, midline, ane left ear), and (c) both of these cues conjointly. In all three conditions the direction of attention was reflected in the amplitude of the N1 wave of the evoked potential, which was selectively enhanced to tones in the attended channel; tones in the central channels in the single-cue conditions, however, produced the least N1 lability and were the least discriminable. The N1 wave was interpreted as a sign of an initial stimulus set or filtering mode of selective attention, whereas a subsequent P3 wave was specifically associated with detections of the target stimuli.

The unusual symmetry of musicians: Musicians have equilateral interhemispheric transfer for visual information

“…The absolute latency of the N1 has been suggested to reflect a discriminative process for attended stimuli (Luck, 1995), in which latency lengthens as the attentional load increases (Callaway & Halliday, 1982;Schwent, Snyder, & Hillyard, 1976). For example, Peeke, Callaway, Jones, Stone, and Doyle (1980) reported shorter N1 latencies and more errors for participants who were sleep deprived or intoxicated with alcohol in comparison to alert, rested participants.…”

Local and global auditory processing: Behavioral and ERP evidence

“…There is extensive evidence that early perceptual processes are modulated by selecting specific sounds for attentive processing on the basis of a simple feature such as location or pitch (e.g., Hansen & Hillyard, 1980;Hillyard, 1981;Schröger & Eimer, 1997;Schwent, Snyder, & Hillyard, 1976). More recent evidence indicates that temporally selective attention also affects perceptual processing.…”

“…Ample evidence exists that selectively attending to a subset of sounds on the basis of a simple feature (e.g., location, time, or pitch) results in differential sensorineural processing of attended and unattended stimuli (Hansen & Hillyard, 1983;Hink & Hillyard, 1976;Lange, et al, 2003; Sanders & Astheimer, 2006;Schwent, et al, 1976;Woods, Alho, & Algazi, 1994). This approach assumes that once sounds are selected for attentive processing, all of the features that make up the attended auditory objects are processed in an attentive manner.…”

Selectively attending to auditory objects

“…When the task-relevant and task-irrelevant tones are highly distinctive and presented at short ISIs (e.g., 200-400 msec), the selective attention effects on ERPs can occur at latencies as short as 30 msec following stimulus onset (56,57). The attention-related changes in ERPs occur when participants attend to a particular stream of sounds in the presence of one or more different streams of distracting stimuli and when stimulus sequences are easily discriminated, whether they are distinguished by spatial position, frequency, or both spatial position and frequency (58)(59)(60). Although there is one report of the habituation of the Nde (61), performance and Nde amplitude are usually maintained over long sessions (59,62,63).…”