title: Learning to recognize speakers of a non-native language: implications for the functional organization of human auditory cortex.
abstract: Brain imaging studies of voice perception often contrast activation from vocal and verbal tasks to identify regions uniquely involved in processing voice. However, such a strategy precludes detection of the functional relationship between speech and voice perception. In a pair of experiments involving identifying voices from native and foreign language speech we show that, even after repeated exposure to the same foreign language speakers, accurate talker identification is in a large part dependent on linguistic proficiency. These results suggest that a strong integration between the brain regions implicated in voice perception and speech perception accounts for the accurate identification of talkers.
authors.affiliation: Department of Linguistics & Program in Cognitive Science, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA. pwong@northwestern.edu
authors.forename: Tyler K
authors.initials: TK
authors.lastname: Perrachione
authors.forename: Patrick C M
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: Wong
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001303:Auditory Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007858:Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D008960:Models, Psychological; D019303:Multilingualism; D010700:Phonetics; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*