Enhanced Delta Band Neural Tracking of Degraded Fundamental Frequency Speech in Noisy Environments.
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| Title: | Enhanced Delta Band Neural Tracking of Degraded Fundamental Frequency Speech in Noisy Environments. |
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| Authors: | Guo, Yu-Jyun1 (AUTHOR), Hsieh, I-Hui1 (AUTHOR) |
| Source: | Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. Jul2025, Vol. 37 Issue 7, p1216-1237. 22p. |
| Subjects: | Intelligibility of speech, Mandarin dialects, Tone (Phonetics), Speech, Signal-to-noise ratio |
| Abstract: | Pitch variation of the fundamental frequency (F0) is critical to speech understanding, especially in noisy environments. Degrading the F0 contour reduces behaviorally measured speech intelligibility, posing greater challenges for tonal languages like Mandarin Chinese where the F0 pattern determines semantic meaning. However, neural tracking of Mandarin speech with degraded F0 information in noisy environments remains unclear. This study investigated neural envelope tracking of continuous Mandarin speech with three F0-flattening levels (original, flat-tone, and flat-all) under various signal-to-noise ratios (0, −9, and −12 dB). F0 contours were flattened at the word level for flat-tone and at the sentence level for flat-all Mandarin speech. Electroencephalography responses were indexed by the temporal response function in the delta (<4 Hz) and theta (4–8 Hz) frequency bands. Results show that delta-band envelope tracking is modulated by the degree of F0 flattening in a nonmonotonic manner. Notably, flat-tone Mandarin speech elicited the strongest envelope tracking compared with both original and flat-all speech, despite reduced F0 information. In contrast, the theta band, which primarily encodes speech signal-to-noise level, was not affected by F0 changes. In addition, listeners with better pitch-related music skills exhibited more efficient neural envelope speech tracking, despite being musically naive. These findings indicate that neural envelope tracking in the delta (but not theta) band is highly specific to F0 pitch variation and highlight the role of intrinsic musical skills for speech-in-noise benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
| Copyright of Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience is the property of MIT Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.) | |
| Database: | Engineering Source |
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| Header | DbId: egs DbLabel: Engineering Source An: 185285767 AccessLevel: 6 PubType: Academic Journal PubTypeId: academicJournal PreciseRelevancyScore: 0 |
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| Items | – Name: Title Label: Title Group: Ti Data: Enhanced Delta Band Neural Tracking of Degraded Fundamental Frequency Speech in Noisy Environments. – Name: Author Label: Authors Group: Au Data: <searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Guo%2C+Yu-Jyun%22">Guo, Yu-Jyun</searchLink><relatesTo>1</relatesTo> (AUTHOR)<br /><searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Hsieh%2C+I-Hui%22">Hsieh, I-Hui</searchLink><relatesTo>1</relatesTo> (AUTHOR) – Name: TitleSource Label: Source Group: Src Data: <searchLink fieldCode="JN" term="%22Journal+of+Cognitive+Neuroscience%22">Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience</searchLink>. Jul2025, Vol. 37 Issue 7, p1216-1237. 22p. – Name: Subject Label: Subjects Group: Su Data: <searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Intelligibility+of+speech%22">Intelligibility of speech</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Mandarin+dialects%22">Mandarin dialects</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Tone+%28Phonetics%29%22">Tone (Phonetics)</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Speech%22">Speech</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Signal-to-noise+ratio%22">Signal-to-noise ratio</searchLink> – Name: Abstract Label: Abstract Group: Ab Data: Pitch variation of the fundamental frequency (F0) is critical to speech understanding, especially in noisy environments. Degrading the F0 contour reduces behaviorally measured speech intelligibility, posing greater challenges for tonal languages like Mandarin Chinese where the F0 pattern determines semantic meaning. However, neural tracking of Mandarin speech with degraded F0 information in noisy environments remains unclear. This study investigated neural envelope tracking of continuous Mandarin speech with three F0-flattening levels (original, flat-tone, and flat-all) under various signal-to-noise ratios (0, −9, and −12 dB). F0 contours were flattened at the word level for flat-tone and at the sentence level for flat-all Mandarin speech. Electroencephalography responses were indexed by the temporal response function in the delta (<4 Hz) and theta (4–8 Hz) frequency bands. Results show that delta-band envelope tracking is modulated by the degree of F0 flattening in a nonmonotonic manner. Notably, flat-tone Mandarin speech elicited the strongest envelope tracking compared with both original and flat-all speech, despite reduced F0 information. In contrast, the theta band, which primarily encodes speech signal-to-noise level, was not affected by F0 changes. In addition, listeners with better pitch-related music skills exhibited more efficient neural envelope speech tracking, despite being musically naive. These findings indicate that neural envelope tracking in the delta (but not theta) band is highly specific to F0 pitch variation and highlight the role of intrinsic musical skills for speech-in-noise benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] – Name: AbstractSuppliedCopyright Label: Group: Ab Data: <i>Copyright of Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience is the property of MIT Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract.</i> (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.) |
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| RecordInfo | BibRecord: BibEntity: Identifiers: – Type: doi Value: 10.1162/jocn_a_02302 Languages: – Code: eng Text: English PhysicalDescription: Pagination: PageCount: 22 StartPage: 1216 Subjects: – SubjectFull: Intelligibility of speech Type: general – SubjectFull: Mandarin dialects Type: general – SubjectFull: Tone (Phonetics) Type: general – SubjectFull: Speech Type: general – SubjectFull: Signal-to-noise ratio Type: general Titles: – TitleFull: Enhanced Delta Band Neural Tracking of Degraded Fundamental Frequency Speech in Noisy Environments. Type: main BibRelationships: HasContributorRelationships: – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Guo, Yu-Jyun – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Hsieh, I-Hui IsPartOfRelationships: – BibEntity: Dates: – D: 01 M: 07 Text: Jul2025 Type: published Y: 2025 Identifiers: – Type: issn-print Value: 0898929X Numbering: – Type: volume Value: 37 – Type: issue Value: 7 Titles: – TitleFull: Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience Type: main |
| ResultId | 1 |
