Language Proficiency and Voice Recognition

In this project we investigate how knowledge of a language affects the ability to recover additional non-linguistics (indexical or paralinguistic) information from a voice. We have shown through a variety of measures that being able to accurately identify voices is in a large part dependent on familiarity with the language the voices are speaking.

The main questions of our research now are: How does linguistic knowledge mediate access to non-linguistic vocal information? What do you "know" when you are familiar with a language that lets you gain access to vocal information otherwise less available to you? We are currently looking at what cortical regions subserve voice perception in a familiar versus nonfamiliar language.

Related Papers & Presentations

Perrachione, T.K. & Wong, P.C.M. (submitted) “Increased left-hemisphere contribution to native- versus foreign-language talker identification revealed by dichotic listening.”

Perrachione, T.K., Chiao, J.Y., Parrish, T.B., Pierrehumbert, J.B., & Wong, P.C.M. (2007). Integration of speech- and voice-perception systems for native language talker identification. Human Brain Mapping, June 2007, Chicago.

Perrachione, T.K., & Wong, P.C.M. (2007). Learning to recognize speakers of a non-native language: Implications for the functional organization of human auditory cortex. Neuropsychologia, 45, 1899-1910.

Wong, P.C.M., Nusbaum, H.C., & Small, S.L. (2004). Neural Bases of Talker Normalization. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 16, 1173-1184.

Investigators

Tyler Perrachione
Patrick Wong

Collaborators

Joan Chiao (Northwestern University)
Janet Pierrehumbert (Northwestern University)
Todd Parrish (Northwestern University)