title: Cerebral processing of voice gender studied using a continuous carryover FMRI design.
abstract: Normal listeners effortlessly determine a person's gender by voice, but the cerebral mechanisms underlying this ability remain unclear. Here, we demonstrate 2 stages of cerebral processing during voice gender categorization. Using voice morphing along with an adaptation-optimized functional magnetic resonance imaging design, we found that secondary auditory cortex including the anterior part of the temporal voice areas in the right hemisphere responded primarily to acoustical distance with the previously heard stimulus. In contrast, a network of bilateral regions involving inferior prefrontal and anterior and posterior cingulate cortex reflected perceived stimulus ambiguity. These findings suggest that voice gender recognition involves neuronal populations along the auditory ventral stream responsible for auditory feature extraction, functioning in pair with the prefrontal cortex in voice gender perception.
authors.affiliation: Medical Research Council-Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit (MRC-CBU), Cambridge CB2 7EF, UK. ian.charest@mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk
authors.forename: Ian
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Charest
authors.forename: Cyril
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Pernet
authors.forename: Marianne
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Latinus
authors.forename: Frances
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Crabbe
authors.forename: Pascal
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Belin
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000098:blood supply* / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D016014:Linear Models; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D010100:Oxygen / Q000097:blood; D011594:Psychometrics; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D014831:Voice; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D010100:Oxygen