Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland.
Eur J Neurosci. 2010 Jan;31(1):189-93. doi: 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2009.07055.x. Epub 2009 Dec 21.
The human auditory system has evolved to efficiently process individual streams of speech. However, obtaining temporally detailed responses to distinct continuous natural speech streams has hitherto been impracticable using standard neurophysiological techniques. Here a method is described which provides for the estimation of a temporally precise electrophysiological response to uninterrupted natural speech. We have termed this response AESPA (Auditory Evoked Spread Spectrum Analysis) and it represents an estimate of the impulse response of the auditory system. It is obtained by assuming that the recorded electrophysiological function represents a convolution of the amplitude envelope of a continuous speech stream with the to-be-estimated impulse response. We present examples of these responses using both scalp and intracranially recorded human EEG, which were obtained while subjects listened to a binaurally presented recording of a male speaker reading naturally from a classic work of fiction. This method expands the arsenal of stimulation types that can now be effectively used to derive auditory evoked responses and allows for the use of considerably more ecologically valid stimulation parameters. Some implications for future research efforts are presented.
人类听觉系统已经进化到能够有效地处理单独的语音流。然而，迄今为止，使用标准神经生理学技术，无法获得对独特连续自然语音流的时间详细响应。这里描述了一种方法，该方法可用于估计对不间断自然语音的时间精确电生理响应。我们将此响应称为 AESPA（听觉诱发扩频分析），它代表了听觉系统的冲激响应的估计。它是通过假设记录的电生理函数表示连续语音流的幅度包络与要估计的冲激响应的卷积而获得的。我们使用头皮和颅内记录的人类 EEG 展示了这些响应的示例，这些 EEG 是在受试者聆听男性演讲者从经典小说中自然朗读的双耳呈现记录时获得的。该方法扩展了可用于得出听觉诱发响应的刺激类型的武器库，并允许使用更具生态有效性的刺激参数。提出了对未来研究工作的一些影响。
