INTERSPEECH 2013 14thAnnual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association Lyon, France August 25-29, 2013

Are Cortical Oscillations a Useful Ingredient of Speech Perception?

Anne-Lise Giraud

Université de Genève, Switzerland

Neuronal oscillations are ubiquitous in the brain and may contribute to cognition in a number of ways, for example by segregating information and organizing spike timing. Recent data show that delta, theta, and gamma oscillations are specifically engaged by the multi-timescale, quasi-rhythmic properties of speech and can track its dynamics. I will present theoretical and experimental data suggesting that auditory cortical oscillatory neural behaviour play a foundational role in speech and language processing by ‘packaging’ incoming information into units of the appropriate temporal granularity, and enabling their readout by higher order brain areas.

Bibliographic reference.  Giraud, Anne-Lise (2013): "Are cortical oscillations a useful ingredient of speech perception?", In INTERSPEECH-2013 (abstract).