Neurosciences Commons^™

The Impact Of Violent Gaming On The Brain As A Function Of Individual Differences In Trait Empathy, Brainscan , Western University, Derek Mitchell, Elizabeth Finger, Richard Neufeld

Project Summaries

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In this project, we will uncover any existing interaction between violent media and the capacity for empathic reactions (known as trait empathy) at a neural level, as the foundational milestone for the kind of large-scale study discussed above.

The level of trait empathy varies by individual - we will explore whether exposure to violent media exacerbates the difficulties that those with low trait empathy already show in relating to the emotions of others

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Relating Functional And Structural Signatures Of Parkinson’S Disease To Changes In Dopamine Signalling: A Pet/Fmri Study, Brainscan . Western University, Penny Macdonald, Udunna Anazodo, Justin Hicks, Frank Prato, Alain Dagher

Project Summaries

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Cognitive impairments in early Parkinson's disease are known to be linked to complex changes in the dopamine system within the brain. For example, dopamine-producing neurons in one key region of the brain are significantly degenerated, but those in another are spared. Dopamine-replacement therapy (DRT) has been pursued and it has produced significant improvements in certain cognitive functions - unfortunately it also produced significant impairments in others.

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Ommaba: The Open Multimodal Music And Auditory Brain Archive, Brainscan , Western University, Jessica Grahn, Jorn Diedrichsen, Joe Gati, Molly Henry, Robert Zatorre, Jean-Baptiste Poline, Bratislav Misic, Estrid Jakobsen, Mor Regev, Marcel Farrés Franch, Virginia Penhune, Emily Coffey

Project Summaries

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We will create a specific neuroimaging database focused on the auditory domain. It will allow researchers to ask questions about the neural circuitry underlying auditory behaviour in the healthy brain and to understand the sources of individual variability. We will include detailed information about experiential factors, such as musicianship and bilingualism that are not documented in any existing databases, so that it will be possible to investigate plasticity-related effects. It will also provide baseline data for clinical studies.

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Assessing Listening With Engaging, Real-World Auditory Signals, Brainscan , Western University, Björn Herrmann, Ingrid Johnsrude 6612111

Project Summaries

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Our project will develop and evaluate a novel way (using functional imaging, fMRI, and electrophysiology, EEG) to assess this cognitive impact of hearing loss with engaging, real‐world auditory stimuli. We will try to assess listening effort in more realistic listening situations among healthy listeners, comparing detected effort in degraded and clear acoustic conditions.

Using EEG, we will then develop measures that are sensitive to the cognitive demands imposed by degraded speech, using these features to assess hearing function with engaging narratives in natural listening conditions.

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Developing Behavioural Testing And Mr Imaging To Evaluate Cognitive Impairment In Models Of Cns Autoimmunity, Brainscan, Western University, Steven Kerfoot, Sarah Morrow, Ravi Menon, Flavio Beraldo

Project Summaries

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This project will investigate cognition and cognitive fatigue in models of CNS autoimmunity. We will use automated touchscreens and fMRI to measure deficits in higher order brain functions.

We have two critical milestones in this project:

• to use touchscreen testing protocols to determine if mouse models demonstrate the same kinds of attention, working memory and cognitive fatigue deficits observed in MS, and
• to use fMRI to measure higher-order defects in the autoimmune models and identify any changes present that might be associated with cognitive dysfunction and the findings from human studies.

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Persistent Post-Concussion Brain Changes In Adolescent Hockey Players, Brainscan, Western University, Kathryn Y. Manning, Amy Schranz, Robert Bartha, Gregory A. Dekaban, Christy Barreira, Arthur Brown, Lisa Fischer, Kevin Asem, Timothy J. Doherty, Douglas D. Fraser, Jeff Holmes, Ravi S. Menon

Research Summaries

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Changes continue to occur in a concussed brain even after standard clinical tests have returned to normal. Damage in the very long fibre tracks in the brain of concussed players can be detected up to three months after the concussion and after the individuals have been approved for return to athletics. It is also possible to detect ‘hyper-connectivity’ in the brain, suggesting the brain is still trying to compensate for the concussion.

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Multiparametric Mri Changes Persist Beyond Recovery In Concussed Adolescent Hockey Players, Kathryn Y. Manning, Amy Schranz, Robert Bartha, Gregory A. Dekaban, Christy Barreira, Arthur Brown, Lisa Fischer, Kevin Asem, Timothy J. Doherty, Douglas D. Fraser, Jeff Holmes, Ravi S. Menon

BrainsCAN Publications

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Objective: To determine whether multiparametric MRI data can provide insight into the acute and long-lasting neuronal sequelae after a concussion in adolescent athletes.

Methods: Players were recruited from Bantam hockey leagues in which body checking is first introduced (male, age 11–14 years). Clinical measures, diffusion metrics, resting-state network and region-to-region functional connectivity patterns, and magnetic resonance spectroscopy absolute metabolite concentrations were analyzed from an independent, age-matched control group of hockey players (n 5 26) and longitudinally in concussed athletes within 24 to 72 hours (n 5 17) and 3 months (n 5 14) after a diagnosed concussion.

Results: There were …

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General And Emotion-Specific Alterations To Cognitive Control In Women With A History Of Childhood Abuse, Kristen L. Mackiewicz Seghete, Roselinde H. Kaiser, Anne P. Deprince, Marie T. Banich

Psychology: Faculty Scholarship

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Background

Although limited, the literature suggests alterations in activation of cognitive control regions in adults and adolescents with a history of childhood abuse. The current study examined whether such alterations are increased in the face of emotionally-distracting as compared to emotionally neutral information, and whether such alterations occur in brain regions that exert cognitive control in a more top-down sustained manner or a more bottom-up transient manner.

Methods

Participants were young adult women (ages 23–30): one group with a history of childhood physical or sexual abuse (N = 15) and one with no trauma exposure (N = 17), as assessed …

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Pruning Or Tuning? Maturational Profiles Of Face Specialization During Typical Development, Xun Zhu, Ramesh S. Bhatt, Jane E. Joseph

Psychology Faculty Publications

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Introduction: Face processing undergoes significant developmental change with age. Two kinds of developmental changes in face specialization were examined in this study: specialized maturation, or the continued tuning of a region to faces but little change in the tuning to other categories; and competitive interactions, or the continued tuning to faces accompanied by decreased tuning to nonfaces (i.e., pruning). Methods: Using fMRI, in regions where adults showed a face preference, a face- and object-specialization index were computed for younger children (5-8 years), older children (9-12 years) and adults (18-45 years). The specialization index was scaled to each subject's maximum activation …

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The Semantic Memory Imaging In Late Life Pilot Study, Michael Adam Sugarman

Wayne State University Dissertations

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Introduction: Several functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies have analyzed the famous name discrimination task (FNDT), an uncontrolled semantic memory probe requiring discrimination between famous and unfamiliar individuals. Completion of this simple task recruits a semantic memory network that has shown utility in determining risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD). Specific semantic memory probes using biographical information associated with famous individuals may build on previous findings and yield superior information regarding risk for AD.

Method: Sixteen cognitively intact elders completed the FNDT and two novel tasks during fMRI: Categories (matching famous individuals to occupational categories) and Attributes (matching famous individuals to …

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Neural Alterations Influencing Skilled Reading In Adhd: A Task-Based Fmri Study, Brianne Mohl

Wayne State University Dissertations

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Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a heterogeneous, neurodevelopmental disorder which co-occurs often with Reading Disability (RD). ADHD with and without RD consistently have higher inattentive ratings compared with typically developing controls, with co-occurring ADHD and RD (ADHD/+RD) also demonstrating impaired phonological processing. Accordingly, inattention has been associated with greater phonological impairment, though neither the neural correlates of the co-occurring disorders nor the association are well understood from a functional neuroimaging perspective. The goal was to assess to what extent ADHD/+RD differ from ADHD without RD (ADHD/-RD) and typically developing controls (TDC) in functional activation of attention- and reading-related areas during various …

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Neural Correlates Of Episodic Memory Formation In Children And Adults, Lingfei Tang

Wayne State University Theses

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The medial temporal lobe (MTL) and prefrontal cortex (PFC) are two key brain regions that support episodic memory formation in both children and adults, but the functional developmental of these regions remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the development of neural correlates of episodic memory formation using functional MRI with a subsequent memory paradigm, administered to a cross-sectional sample of 83 children and adults. We found that MTL subregions showed an age-related increase in activation supporting memory formation of complex scenes. In addition, a functionally defined scene-sensitive region in the posterior MTL also showed similar increase and predicted better …

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Beyond Perceptual Expertise: Revisiting The Neural Substrates Of Expert Object Recognition, Assaf Harel, Dwight J. Kravitz, Chris I. Baker

Psychology Faculty Publications

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Real-world expertise provides a valuable opportunity to understand how experience shapes human behavior and neural function. In the visual domain, the study of expert object recognition, such as in car enthusiasts or bird watchers, has produced a large, growing, and often-controversial literature. Here, we synthesize this literature, focusing primarily on results from functional brain imaging, and propose an interactive framework that incorporates the impact of high-level factors, such as attention and conceptual knowledge, in supporting expertise. This framework contrasts with the perceptual view of object expertise that has concentrated largely on stimulus-driven processing in visual cortex. One prominent version of …

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Reducing Multi-Sensor Data To A Single Time Course That Reveals Experimental Effects, Aaron Schurger, Sebastien Marti, Stanislas Dehaene

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

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Background: Multi-sensor technologies such as EEG, MEG, and ECoG result in high-dimensional data sets. Given the high temporal resolution of such techniques, scientific questions very often focus on the time-course of an experimental effect. In many studies, researchers focus on a single sensor or the average over a subset of sensors covering a “region of interest” (ROI). However, single-sensor or ROI analyses ignore the fact that the spatial focus of activity is constantly changing, and fail to make full use of the information distributed over the sensor array.

Methods: We describe a technique that exploits the optimality and …

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Network Dynamics Of Visual Naming, Christopher R. Conner

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

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Recognition and naming of objects and actions are fundamental components of language. They involve several different systems working in coordination to accomplish a complex behavior. During visual naming, sensory and semantic processing are carried out by dedicated cortical substrates in the temporal and occipital lobes, while response selection and articulatory planning are handled by prefrontal cortex. Despite decades of research using lesion analysis, functional MRI and electro-encephalography, the precise dynamics involved remain unknown due to the inadequate spatio-temporal resolution of these methodologies. Of particular interest is the organization of semantic knowledge and the degree of serial and parallel organization of …

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Shared Neural Substrates Of Emotionally Enhanced Perceptual And Mnemonic Vividness, Rebecca M. Todd, Taylor W. Schmitz, Josh Susskind, Adam K. Anderson

Brain and Mind Institute Researchers' Publications

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It is well known that emotionally salient events are remembered more vividly than mundane ones. Our recent research has demonstrated that such memory vividness is due in part to the subjective experience of emotional events as more perceptually vivid, an effect we call emotion-enhanced vividness, or EEV. The present study built on previously reported research in which fMRI data were collected while participants rated relative levels of visual noise overlaid on emotionally salient and neutral images. Ratings of greater EEV were associated with greater activation in the amygdala, visual cortex, and posterior insula. In the present study, we measured BOLD …

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The Effects Of Mindfulness Meditation On Rumination In Depressed People, Rachel A. Sluder

Honors Theses and Capstones

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Mindfulness meditation is a practice of focus, awareness, and non-judgmental acceptance of one's thoughts (Deyo et al., 2009; Kenny et al., 2007). Rumination is a maladaptive pattern of thought that is common in people with depression and other mood disorders. It can lead to further episodes of depression, and can be very destructive in that way (Nolen-Hoeksema, 2008). This paper reviews several studies on mindfulness meditation, depression, and rumination, with a focus on certain areas and phenomena such as alpha asymmetry (Keune et al 2013) and gamma band activity (Berkovich-Ohana et al., 2012). Modalities such as fMRI and EEG are …

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Training Verb Argument Structure Production In Agrammatic Aphasia: Behavioral And Neural Recovery Patterns, Cynthia K. Thompson, Ellyn A. Riley, Dirk B. Den Ouden, Aya Meltzer-Asscher, Sladjana Lukic

Communication Sciences and Disorders Faculty Articles and Research

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Introduction

Neuroimaging and lesion studies indicate a left hemisphere network for verb and verb argument structure processing, involving both frontal and temporoparietal brain regions. Although their verb comprehension is generally unimpaired, it is well known that individuals with agrammatic aphasia often present with verb production deficits, characterized by an argument structure complexity hierarchy, indicating faulty access to argument structure representations for production and integration into syntactic contexts. Recovery of verb processing in agrammatism, however, has received little attention and no studies have examined the neural mechanisms associated with improved verb and argument structure processing. In the present study we trained …

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The Influence Of Gender And Aging On The Neural Circuitry Supporing Facial Emotion Processing In Adults With Major Depressive Disorder, Emily Briceno

Wayne State University Dissertations

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Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) is associated with decrements in facial emotion processing (FEP). Previous studies investigating the neural substrates of these decrements have often reported hyperactivity of emotion processing circuitry. Neural circuitry supporting FEP has been shown to be different between healthy men and women, and between young and elder adults. However, no prior studies have investigated how gender and aging affect emotion processing circuitry in individuals with MDD. The present study aimed to investigate the influence of gender and aging on emotion processing circuitry in MDD. One hundred-ten adults, grouped into subgroups according to MDD status, gender, and age …

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The Neural Substrates Of Complex Argument Structure Representations: Processing “Alternating Transitivity” Verbs, Aya Meltzer-Asscher, Julia Schuchard, Dirk B. Den Ouden, Cynthia K. Thompson

Communication Sciences and Disorders Faculty Articles and Research

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This study examines the neural correlates of processing verbal entries with multiple argument structures using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We compared brain activation in response to “alternating transitivity” verbs, corresponding to two different verbal alternates—one transitive and one intransitive—and simple verbs, with only one, intransitive, thematic grid. Fourteen young healthy participants performed a lexical decision task with the two verb types. Results showed significantly greater activation in the angular and supramarginal gyri (Brodmann areas (BAs) 39 and 40) extending to the posterior superior and middle temporal gyri bilaterally, for alternating compared to simple verbs. Additional activation was detected in …

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Behavioral And Fmri Evidence That Cognitive Ability Modulates The Effect Of Semantic Context On Speech Intelligibility, Adriana A Zekveld, Mary Rudner, Ingrid Johnsrude, Dirk J Heslenfeld, Jerker Rönnberg

Brain and Mind Institute Researchers' Publications

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Text cues facilitate the perception of spoken sentences to which they are semantically related (Zekveld, Rudner, et al., 2011). In this study, semantically related and unrelated cues preceding sentences evoked more activation in middle temporal gyrus (MTG) and inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) than nonword cues, regardless of acoustic quality (speech in noise or speech in quiet). Larger verbal working memory (WM) capacity (reading span) was associated with greater intelligibility benefit obtained from related cues, with less speech-related activation in the left superior temporal gyrus and left anterior IFG, and with more activation in right medial frontal cortex for related versus …

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Investigation Of Spatio-Temporal Effects Of Fmri Visual Field Mapping Techniques On V1, John J. Janik

Dissertations (1934 -)

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Blood oxygenation level dependent functional magnetic resonance imaging has been used extensively for mapping the representation of the visual field within the human brain. Visual field mapping using fMRI has been used clinically to assess patients with cortical pathology and to plan surgical treatment impacting the visual system. The accuracy of fMRI-based visual field mapping methods needs to be better understood for clinical use. This accuracy can be important for presurgical mapping of brain function near a tumor resection site since inaccurate rendition of the underlying neural function could lead to inappropriate resection of viable brain tissue. The most widely …

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Network Modulation During Complex Syntactic Processing, Dirk B. Den Ouden, Dorothee Saur, Wolfgang Mader, Björn Schelter, Sladjana Lukic, Eisha Wali, Jens Timmer, Cynthia K. Thompson

Communication Sciences and Disorders Faculty Articles and Research

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Complex sentence processing is supported by a left-lateralized neural network including inferior frontal cortex and posterior superior temporal cortex. This study investigates the pattern of connectivity and information flow within this network. We used fMRI BOLD data derived from 12 healthy participants reported in an earlier study (Thompson, C. K., Den Ouden, D. B., Bonakdarpour, B., Garibaldi, K., & Parrish, T. B. (2010b). Neural plasticity and treatment-induced recovery of sentence processing in agrammatism. Neuropsychologia, 48(11), 3211–3227) to identify activation peaks associated with object-cleft over syntactically less complex subject-cleft processing. Directed Partial Correlation Analysis was conducted on time series …

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Neural Plasticity And Treatment-Induced Recovery Of Sentence Processing In Agrammatism, Cynthia K. Thompson, Dirk B. Den Ouden, Borna Bonakdarpour, Kyla Garibaldi, Todd B. Parrish

Communication Sciences and Disorders Faculty Articles and Research

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This study examined patterns of neural activation associated with treatment-induced improvement of complex sentence production (and comprehension) in six individuals with stroke-induced agrammatic aphasia, taking into account possible alterations in blood flow often associated with stroke, including delayed time-to-peak of the hemodynamic response function (HRF) and hypoperfused tissue. Aphasic participants performed an auditory verification fMRI task, processing object cleft, subject cleft, and simple active sentences, prior to and following a course of Treatment of Underlying Forms (TUF; Thompson et al., 2003), a linguistically based approach for treating aphasic sentence deficits, which targeted object relative clause constructions. The patients also were …

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Argument Structure Effects In Action Verb Naming In Static And Dynamic Conditions, Dirk B. Den Ouden, Steve Fix, Todd B. Parrish, Cynthia K. Thompson

Communication Sciences and Disorders Faculty Articles and Research

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Argument structure, as in the participant roles entailed within the lexical representation of verbs, affects verb processing. Recent neuroimaging studies show that when verbs are heard or read, the posterior temporoparietal region shows increased activation for verbs with greater versus lesser argument structure complexity, usually bilaterally. In addition, patients with agrammatic aphasia show verb production deficits, graded based on argument structure complexity. In the present study, we used fMRI to examine the neural correlates of verb production in overt action naming conditions. In addition, we tested the differential effects of naming when verbs were presented dynamically in video segments versus …

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Activation Of Brain Regions Vulnerable To Alzheimer's Disease: The Effect Of Mild Cognitive Impairment, S. C. Johnson, T. W. Schmitz, C. H. Moritz, M. E. Meyerand, H. A. Rowley, A. L. Alexander, K. W. Hansen, C. E. Gleason, C. M. Carlsson, M. L. Ries, S. Asthana, K. Chen, E. M. Reiman, G. E. Alexander

Brain and Mind Institute Researchers' Publications

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This study examined the functionality of the medial temporal lobe (MTL) and posterior cingulate (PC) in mild cognitive impairment amnestic type (MCI), a syndrome that puts patients at greater risk for developing Alzheimer disease (AD). Functional MRI (fMRI) was used to identify regions normally active during encoding of novel items and recognition of previously learned items in a reference group of 77 healthy young and middle-aged adults. The pattern of activation in this group guided further comparisons between 14 MCI subjects and 14 age-matched controls. The MCI patients exhibited less activity in the PC during recognition of previously learned items, …

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Hierarchical Processing In Spoken Language Comprehension., Matthew H Davis, Ingrid Johnsrude

Brain and Mind Institute Researchers' Publications

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Understanding spoken language requires a complex series of processing stages to translate speech sounds into meaning. In this study, we use functional magnetic resonance imaging to explore the brain regions that are involved in spoken language comprehension, fractionating this system into sound-based and more abstract higher-level processes. We distorted English sentences in three acoustically different ways, applying each distortion to varying degrees to produce a range of intelligibility (quantified as the number of words that could be reported) and collected whole-brain echo-planar imaging data from 12 listeners using sparse imaging. The blood oxygenation level-dependent signal correlated with intelligibility along the …

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