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Auditory Pattern Representations Under Conditions of Uncertainty—An ERP Study

The auditory system is able to recognize auditory objects and is thought to form
predictive models of them even though the acoustic information arriving at our ears is
often imperfect, intermixed, or distorted. We investigated implicit regularity extraction for
acoustically intact versus disrupted six-tone sound patterns via event-related potentials
(ERPs). In an exact-repetition condition, identical patterns were repeated; in two
distorted-repetition conditions, one randomly chosen segment in each sound pattern
was replaced either by white noise or by a wrong pitch. In a roving-standard paradigm,
sound patterns were repeated 1–12 times (standards) in a row before a new pattern
(deviant) occurred. The participants were not informed about the roving rule and had to
detect rarely occurring loudness changes. Behavioral detectability of pattern changes
was assessed in a subsequent behavioral task. Pattern changes (standard vs. deviant)

elicited mismatch negativity (MMN) and P3a, and were behaviorally detected above the
chance level in all conditions, suggesting that the auditory system extracts regularities
despite distortions in the acoustic input. However, MMN and P3a amplitude were
decreased by distortions. At the level of MMN, both types of distortions caused similar
impairments, suggesting that auditory regularity extraction is largely determined by the
stimulus statistics of matching information. At the level of P3a, wrong-pitch distortions
caused larger decreases than white-noise distortions. Wrong-pitch distortions likely
prevented the engagement of restoration mechanisms and the segregation of disrupted
from true pattern segments, causing stronger informational interference with the relevant
pattern information

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:DRESDEN/oai:qucosa:de:qucosa:84344
Date27 March 2023
CreatorsBader, Maria, Schröger, Erich, Grimm, Sabine
PublisherFrontiers Research Foundation
Source SetsHochschulschriftenserver (HSSS) der SLUB Dresden
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typeinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion, doc-type:article, info:eu-repo/semantics/article, doc-type:Text
Rightsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
Relation1662-5161, 682820

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