Brown Jane A, Bidelman Gavin M
School of Communication Sciences and Disorders, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN 38152, USA.
Institute for Intelligent Systems, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN 38152, USA.
Brain Sci. 2022 Sep 29;12(10):1320. doi: 10.3390/brainsci12101320.
The "cocktail party" problem-how a listener perceives speech in noisy environments-is typically studied using speech (multi-talker babble) or noise maskers. However, realistic cocktail party scenarios often include background music (e.g., coffee shops, concerts). Studies investigating music's effects on concurrent speech perception have predominantly used highly controlled synthetic music or shaped noise, which do not reflect naturalistic listening environments. Behaviorally, familiar background music and songs with vocals/lyrics inhibit concurrent speech recognition. Here, we investigated the neural bases of these effects. While recording multichannel EEG, participants listened to an audiobook while popular songs (or silence) played in the background at a 0 dB signal-to-noise ratio. Songs were either familiar or unfamiliar to listeners and featured either vocals or isolated instrumentals from the original audio recordings. Comprehension questions probed task engagement. We used temporal response functions (TRFs) to isolate cortical tracking to the target speech envelope and analyzed neural responses around 100 ms (i.e., auditory N1 wave). We found that speech comprehension was, expectedly, impaired during background music compared to silence. Target speech tracking was further hindered by the presence of vocals. When masked by familiar music, response latencies to speech were less susceptible to informational masking, suggesting concurrent neural tracking of speech was easier during music known to the listener. These differential effects of music familiarity were further exacerbated in listeners with less musical ability. Our neuroimaging results and their dependence on listening skills are consistent with early attentional-gain mechanisms where familiar music is easier to tune out (listeners already know the song's expectancies) and thus can allocate fewer attentional resources to the background music to better monitor concurrent speech material.
“鸡尾酒会”问题——即听众如何在嘈杂环境中感知语音——通常使用语音（多说话者嘈杂声）或噪声掩蔽器进行研究。然而，现实的鸡尾酒会场景通常包括背景音乐（如咖啡店、音乐会）。调查音乐对同时进行的语音感知影响的研究主要使用高度受控的合成音乐或成形噪声，这些并不能反映自然的聆听环境。从行为学角度来看，熟悉的背景音乐以及带有歌声/歌词的歌曲会抑制同时进行的语音识别。在此，我们研究了这些影响的神经基础。在记录多通道脑电图时，参与者收听有声读物，同时以0分贝的信噪比在背景中播放流行歌曲（或静音）。歌曲对听众来说要么熟悉要么陌生，并且要么是原始录音中的歌声，要么是单独的乐器演奏。理解问题用于探测任务参与度。我们使用时间响应函数（TRF）来分离对目标语音包络的皮层跟踪，并分析100毫秒左右（即听觉N1波）的神经反应。我们发现，与静音相比，背景音乐期间的语音理解能力如预期那样受到损害。歌声的存在进一步阻碍了对目标语音的跟踪。当被熟悉的音乐掩蔽时，对语音的反应潜伏期对信息掩蔽的敏感度较低，这表明在听众熟悉的音乐期间，对语音的同时神经跟踪更容易。音乐熟悉度的这些差异效应在音乐能力较低的听众中进一步加剧。我们的神经成像结果及其对聆听技能的依赖性与早期的注意力增益机制一致，即熟悉的音乐更容易被排除（听众已经知道歌曲的预期），因此可以将更少的注意力资源分配给背景音乐，以便更好地监测同时出现的语音材料。
