The origin of interindividual differences in audiovisual speech perception, combining neuroimaging, eye movements and behavior
Cognitive, Systems and Behavioural Neurobiology
Final Report Abstract
Our results provide new insights into the functional specialization of the human pSTS. The results are relevant to natural conditions because these regions were identified based on natural viewing behaviors during free viewing of talking faces. The posterior mouth-preferring subregion of pSTS has a number of qualities that suggest a critical role in audiovisual speech perception. First, it lies anterior to the eye-preferring pSTS subregion and is adjacent to auditory cortex, an ideal anatomical location for integrating auditory and visual information. Second, it shows strong responses to both auditory speech information (unisensory auditory) and visual speech information in the form of mouth movements (unisensory visual) as would be expected for a region that integrates auditory and visual speech.
