Basic neural processing of sound in adults is influenced by bilingual experience

Skoe, Erika; Burakiewicz, Emily; Figueiredo, Mauro; Hardin, Margaret D.

doi:10.1016/j.neuroscience.2017.02.049

Cited by 29 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 95 publications

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“…Nevertheless, our small study provides an important data point in the larger discussion on the potential disadvantages of being bilingual by helping to delineate the conditions under which the bilingual disadvantage for SUN may or may not emerge for bilingual speakers who self-report as having native-like abilities in the test language. In addition, our study adds to the conversation on the potential benefits of being bilingual by providing evidence that the auditory processing advantages that have emerged for nonlinguistic stimuli (Bak et al, 2014;Krizman et al, 2016) and for auditory-evoked potentials to passively attended speech stimuli (Vihla et al, 2002;Krizman et al, 2012;2015;Skoe et al, 2017) do not lead to any apparent behavioral benefits on the R-SPIN test nor on three tests routinely used to clinically assess CAPD. However, as seen in the present study, most of the participants (regardless of group) performed at or near ceiling on DDT and CST, suggesting that these linguistic-based tests of CAP lack the sensitivity to evaluate individual or group-level differences in CAP for high-performing (nonimpaired) listeners.…”

Section: Bilingual Advantages and Disadvantagesmentioning

confidence: 76%

“…Montagni and Peru (2011) provide additional evidence that early exposure to a second language confers an advantage to auditory processing tasks across both linguistic and musical stimuli. Moreover, early exposure to two languages (for both children and adults) has also been associated with more robust (pre-attentive) neural processing of speech sounds in both quiet and background babble conditions (Krizman et al, 2012;2015;Skoe et al, 2017).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Bilingualism and Speech Understanding in Noise: Auditory and Linguistic Factors

Skoe

Karayanidi

2019

J Am Acad Audiol

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Bilingual speakers often have difficulty understanding speech in noisy and acoustically degraded conditions.The first aim was to examine the potential source(s) of the difficulties that English-proficient bilingual listeners experience when hearing English speech in noise. The second aim was to assess how bilingual listeners perform on a battery of central auditory processing tests.A mixed design was used in this study.Normal-hearing college students (n = 24) participated in this study. The bilingual participants (n = 12) self-reported that they learned a second language before age 9 and the monolingual participants reported that they only knew American English. All participants considered themselves to be native speakers of American English.Participants were administered the Revised Speech Perception in Noise (R-SPIN) test to assess whether bilingual listeners’ speech understanding in noise reflects auditory factors, linguistic factors, or a combination of the two. To minimize the influence of short-term memory and motor movements, only the final word of a sentence is repeated for this test. Sentence-final words were presented in two linguistic contexts: in the high-predictability condition, the final word can be deduced from the context created by the preceding words, and in the low-predictability condition, it cannot. The R-SPIN test was administered at two signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) (0 and 3 dB). In addition, the participants were given a reading comprehension test to measure their ability to use context when linguistic stimuli are delivered to the visual, not auditory, modality. The central auditory test battery consisted of three tests: Competing Sentences, Dichotic Digits, and NU-6 Time-Compressed Speech with Reverberation. All test materials were given in American English.The bilingual and monolingual groups performed similarly in the low-context condition of the R-SPIN test. However, in comparison to the age-matched monolingual group, the bilingual group did not derive the same level of benefit from contextual cues, as seen by a smaller improvement in performance between the low- and high-predictability R-SPIN conditions. The bilingual and monolingual groups showed a similar decrement in performance when the SNR dropped. In addition, bilingual individuals underperformed on the Competing Sentences test when instructed to attend to the left ear. However, the bilingual and monolingual groups performed equally well on the reading comprehension test, as well as on the Time-Compressed Speech with Reverberation and Dichotic Digits tests.We show that individuals who are exposed to two languages from an early age, and self-report as having a high level of proficiency in English, perform like their monolingual counterparts in acoustically degraded conditions where context is not facilitative, but they underperform in conditions where sentence-level linguistic context is facilitative to understanding. We conclude that deficits observed in noise are likely not due to a perceptual deficit or a lack of linguistic competence, but instead reflect a linguistic system that performs inefficiently in noise. In addition, we do not find evidence of an auditory processing weakness or advantage in our bilingual cohort; however, the use of speech materials to assess auditory processing is a confound.

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Section: Bilingual Advantages and Disadvantagesmentioning

confidence: 76%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Bilingualism and Speech Understanding in Noise: Auditory and Linguistic Factors

Skoe

Karayanidi

2019

J Am Acad Audiol

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“…An additional possibility is that it may be due to enhanced pitch processing in bilingual listeners. Recent findings from Skoe and colleagues (Skoe, Burakiewicz, Figueiredo & Hardin, 2017) demonstrated that the electrophysiological response to fundamental frequency information is more robust in bilingual compared to monolingual adults. They measured the frequency following response (FFR), which is a phase locked response to sound that occurs in the central auditory nervous system, for monolingual English speakers and a diverse group of bilingual speakers (the second language varied across bilingual speakers, as did age of acquisition for the second language).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Pitch perception as a general auditory ability also influences voice recognition, with its role heightened for nonnative compared to native voices (Xie & Myers, 2015). Though bilinguals show enhanced encoding of fundamental frequency in the central auditory nervous system compared to monolinguals (Skoe et al, 2017), the evidence of that sensitivity leading a global bilingual advantage for voice recognition is mixed. Indeed, the inconsistent evidence of a bilingual advantage for voice recognition is not unique given the broader literature on bilingual advantages for cognitive processing (e.g., Paap & Greenberg, 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Talker processing was assessed for English (a familiar language) and French (an unfamiliar language) voices. As in Levi (2018) and Skoe et al (2017), bilingual participants represented diverse language backgrounds. In addition to the identification task, participants completed a pitch perception task (Xie & Myers, 2015), and auditory Stroop (Sommers & Danielson, 1999) and flanker (Eriksen & Eriksen, 1974) tasks to assess inhibition in the auditory and visual domains, respectively.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Determinants of voice recognition in monolingual and bilingual listeners

Theodore

Flanagan

2019

Bilingualism

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Recent findings demonstrate a bilingual advantage for voice processing in children, but the mechanism supporting this advantage is unknown. Here we examined whether a bilingual advantage for voice processing is observed in adults and, if so, if it reflects enhanced pitch perception or inhibitory control. Voice processing was assessed for monolingual and bilingual adults using an associative learning identification task and a discrimination task in English (a familiar language) and French (an unfamiliar language). Participants also completed pitch perception, flanker, and auditory Stroop tasks. Voice processing was improved for the familiar compared to the unfamiliar language and reflected individual differences in pitch perception (both tasks) and inhibitory control (identification task). However, no bilingual advantage was observed for either voice task, suggesting that the bilingual advantage for voice processing becomes attenuated during maturation, with performance in adulthood reflecting knowledge of linguistic structure in addition to general auditory and inhibitory control abilities.

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