Determinants of Voice Learning

• Applicant: Dr. Romi Zäske
• Subject Area: General, Cognitive and Mathematical Psychology ; Human Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience
• Term: from 2012 to 2016
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 69199027

• Final Report Year: 2017

Final Report Abstract

While listeners can easily recognize familiar speakers from their voices, it is largely unclear how voices become familiar, i.e. how long-term voice representations are acquired during learning. In the first funding period we explored the neural correlates of voice learning and recognition independent of speech content. We thereby established voice recognition memory paradigms for EEG and fMRI and revealed the timing and anatomical basis for the establishment of novel voice representations. Building on this successful work, we went on to investigate and refine the role of facial information during voice learning. We further demonstrated effects of speaker and listener age on voice learning as reflected in performance, ERPs and oscillatory brain responses. We further investigated short-term memory effects of adaptation with morphed voice stimuli as provided by project 5. Here we showed 1) that the processing of vocal gender and age is partially intertwined, 2) that listeners can only fully process one voice at a time, and 3) that visual working memory load, but not visual perceptual load, determines implicit voice processing. In the second funding period we created and evaluated a novel speaker database (JESS) in collaboration with project 5. Correlational data for ratings of voices and faces highlighted the importance of differentiating between common measures of distinctiveness, and challenged the notion that faces and voices are mutual markers of genetic fitness. Finally, a comprehensive study on ratings of attractiveness, likeability, distinctiveness, accent, and age for unfamiliar voices revealed that personal impressions from voices depend both on the age and sex of the speaker. Overall, this project largely contributed to our understanding of memory phenomena for voices and their neural correlated as determined by stimulus characteristics, speaker and listener attributes as well as attentional demands.

Publications

• (2013). Perceiving vocal age and gender: An adaptation approach. Acta Psychologica, 144(3), 583-593
  Zäske, R., Skuk, V. G., Kaufmann, J. M., & Schweinberger, S. R.
  
• (2013). Spatial inattention abolishes voice adaptation. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 75(3), 603-613
  Zäske, R., Fritz, C., & Schweinberger, S. R.
  
• (2014). Electrophysiological Correlates of Voice Learning and Recognition. Journal of Neuroscience, 34(33), 10821-10831
  Zäske, R., Volberg, G., Kovács, G., & Schweinberger, S. R.
  
• (2014). Speaker Perception. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Cognitive Science, 5(1), 15-25
  Schweinberger, S. R., Kawahara, H., Simpson, A. P., Skuk, V.G., & Zäske, R.
  
• (2015). Benefits for Voice Learning Caused by Concurrent Faces Develop over Time. Plos One, 10(11)
  Zäske, R., Muehl, C., & Schweinberger, S. R.
  
• (2016). To hear or not to hear: voice processing under visual load, Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 78(5), 1488-1495
  Zäske, R., Perlich, M.C., & Schweinberger, S.R.
  
• (2017). It doesn’t matter what you say: fMRI correlates of voice learning and recognition independent of speech content, Cortex, 94, 100-112
  Zäske, R., Hasan, B.A.S., & Belin P.
  
• Electrophysiological correlates of voice memory for young and old speakers in young and old listeners, Neuropsychologia
  Zäske, R., Limbach, K., Schneider, D., Skuk, V.G., Dobel, C., Guntinas-Lichius, O., & Schweinberger, S.R.