Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.
J Exp Psychol Gen. 2017 Jan;146(1):77-88. doi: 10.1037/xge0000246.
Many natural auditory signals, including music and language, change periodically. The effect of such auditory rhythms on the brain is unclear however. One widely held view, dynamic attending theory, proposes that the attentional system entrains to the rhythm and increases attention at moments of rhythmic salience. In support, 2 experiments reported here show reduced response times to visual letter strings shown at auditory rhythm peaks, compared with rhythm troughs. However, we argue that an account invoking the entrainment of general attention should further predict rhythm entrainment to also influence memory for visual stimuli. In 2 pseudoword memory experiments we find evidence against this prediction. Whether a pseudoword is shown during an auditory rhythm peak or not is irrelevant for its later recognition memory in silence. Other attention manipulations, dividing attention and focusing attention, did result in a memory effect. This raises doubts about the suggested attentional nature of rhythm entrainment. We interpret our findings as support for auditory rhythm perception being based on auditory-motor entrainment, not general attention entrainment. (PsycINFO Database Record
许多自然的听觉信号，包括音乐和语言，都是周期性变化的。然而，这种听觉节奏对大脑的影响尚不清楚。一种广泛持有的观点，即动态注意理论，提出注意力系统与节奏同步，并在节奏突出的时刻增加注意力。为此，这里报告的 2 个实验表明，与节奏低谷相比，在听觉节奏峰值处呈现的视觉字母串的反应时间减少。然而，我们认为，援引一般注意力同步的解释应该进一步预测节奏同步也会影响视觉刺激的记忆。在 2 个假词记忆实验中，我们发现这一预测的证据不足。在听觉节奏峰值期间或期间不显示假词与其在安静时的后续识别记忆无关。其他注意力操作，如分散注意力和集中注意力，确实产生了记忆效应。这对所建议的节奏同步的注意力性质提出了质疑。我们将我们的发现解释为支持听觉节奏感知基于听觉-运动同步，而不是一般注意力同步。
