The present study examined cortical auditory evoked related potentials (AERPs) for the P1-N250 and MMN components in children 9 years of age. The first goal was to investigate whether AERPs respond differentially to vowels and complex tones, and the second goal was to explore how prototypical language formant structures might be reflected in these early auditory processing stages. Stimuli were ...

In three experiments, we examined how readers learn and generalize new pronunciations for vowel graphemes. Children ages 6 1/2 to 9 (n = 97) and college students (n = 21) were taught a nonword that included a novel vowel pronunciation in the middle position (e.g., zuop is pronounced /zup/). They were then asked to pronounce other nonwords that contained the same vowel grapheme. Participants wer...

Beginning level Mandarin learners with different L1 backgrounds received six hours of Mandarin tone training using phrases and sentences produced by multiple native Mandarin speakers. Using Kay Elementric’s Sona Speech II software with real time display of pitch contours along with speech output on a PC computer, the trainees had both auditory and visual input when they recorded and compared th...

Speech perception and production are intimately linked. There is evidence that speech motor learning results in changes to auditory processing of speech. Whether speech motor control benefits from perceptual learning in speech, however, remains unclear. This event-related potential study investigated whether speech-sound learning can modulate the processing of feedback errors during vocal pitch...

The accuracy with which native Japanese listeners identified American English vowels and coda nasals was assessed before and after training. The listeners were divided into four groups, each of which received a different type of training. Two of the four groups were vowel-oriented; one of these groups received vowel identification training (VI), while the other received vowel discrimination tra...

Computer Assisted Pronunciation Training systems have become popular tools to train on second languages. Many second language learners prefer to train on pronunciation in a stress free environment with no other listeners. There exists no such tool for training on pronunciation of the Norwegian language. Pronunciation exercises in training systems should be directed at important properties in th...

background and aim: aging is accompanied with changes in cognitive capacities. in spite of advances in neural imaging technologies, there is not a straightforward method to observe cognitive functions. for assessing brain functions, researchers mainly use psychometric tests. the aim of this study was using consonant-vowel (cv) dichotic test as a non-invasive behavioral test for auditory attenti...