Prosody perception in cochlear implant listeners - Project Summary / Abstract Vocal prosody inflections are essential to function in everyday communication. For example, pitch (F0) – conveys information about expressing agreement or disagreement, to correct, to signal novel information, or to indicate between-the-lines meaning. Cochlear implants are notoriously poor at delivering accurate information about a talker’s voice pitch (Carlyon et al. 2002; Oxenham 2008). Difficulty in perceiving prosodic information is highlighted by CI patient reports of communication breakdown and listening complaints where the tone or hidden meaning of a message is misunderstood (Rapport et al. 2020). Predictably, standard speech perception measures based on intelligibility alone do not explain variability in communication ability or quality of life for listeners with cochlear implants (Capretta & Moberly 2016; Hinderink et al. 2000; Moberly et al 2018). Conversely, test batteries that specifically include skills related to vocal prosody are better at predicting quality of life and communication-related measures among listeners with cochlear implants, underscoring the need for further understanding of how to assess vocal prosody perception (Luo et al. 2018; Panzeri et al. 2021). To provide a person with the best ability to function in a social world where perception of a talker’s tone and intention play a vital role, we must better understand how perception of prosody is affected by the use of a cochlear implant. The first aim of the proposed work will compare perception of prosodic focus by listeners with normal hearing and cochlear implants. Importantly, listeners will report prosody perception for whole-sentence stimuli and provide responses using a multiple sliding-scale interface that will allow for differentiation of stronger and weaker perceptions of prosody, as well as characterization of errors in prosody perception relative to the talker’s intended target. The second aim will explore the perceptual weighting of pitch, intensity, and duration cues in prosody perception for both groups, as well as basic psychophysical measures to determine perceptual access to prosodic prominence. The third aim will examine the impact of noise on prosodic cue weighting by these two listener groups. Results from these examinations will show how differences in prosodic cue weighting result in weaker prosody perception and frequent mistakes for CI listeners, as well as a greater impact of noise on prosody perception. The long-term goals of this project are to improve our understanding of prosody perception for CI users. These goals directly address the NIDCD’s priority of increasing our knowledge on communication by individuals with hearing loss in real world environments. The training program involves extensive instruction in behavioral measures, acoustic analysis and manipulation, and advanced statistical analysis relevant to the proposed research. This research will be conducted under the mentorship of leading experts in hearing at an institution with a strong track record of hearing loss research, a history of training grants, and interdisciplinary collaboration in clinical sensory science.
