Cochlear suppression is essential for coding complex sounds but poorly characterized in hearing loss

Evidence

Our Wiener-kernel approach demonstrated reduced suppression in ANF responses from HI animals, which was correlated with a loss of frequency selectivity. These HI animals also exhibited reduced magnitude DPOAEs: additional evidence of reduced compressive nonlinearity. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3878 (#expands, via linked claim)

There is substantial variability in the relative contribution of suppression to ANF responses (Fig. 5a ), similar to that observed with tone stimuli in the “fractional-response” metric (e.g., Miller et al. 1997 ). There is a group of fibers (both NH and HI) across the CF axis, which show no significant suppression ( ; Fig. 5a ). These are mainly, but not exclusively, of the high-spontaneous-rate class (≥ 18 spikes s‑1 ). HI fibers in the region of greatest damage (~ 2–5 kHz) tend to have reduced suppression. Plotting vs . CF-normalized 10-dB bandwidth, we find a significant correlation between broadened tuning and loss of suppression (Fig. 5b ). Considering only CFs > 2 kHz in this linear regression increased the variance explained from 9.1 to 18.4 %. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3871 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Specifically, we describe an experiment designed to examine how the loss of cochlear compression affects the recognition of relatively soft syllables occurring in the presence of louder, flanking syllables of varying levels. The aim is to reveal the role of cochlear compression in multi-speaker environments or those with disruptive background noise. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 4046 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Suppression tuning curves mirror inner-ear neurophysiological frequency selectivity; Hearing loss reduces cochlear suppression and compressive nonlinearity together — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3878; Cochlear suppression includes an on-CF component preceding excitation (+3 more)

Related

• Suppression tuning curves mirror inner-ear neurophysiological frequency selectivity (similarity 0.91)
• Hearing loss reduces cochlear suppression and compressive nonlinearity together (similarity 0.90)
• Broadened frequency tuning correlates with loss of suppression in auditory nerve fibers (similarity 0.89)
• Noise-induced hearing loss reduces several independent markers of cochlear compression (similarity 0.88)
• Loss of cochlear compression alone impairs hearing soft syllables amid louder ones (similarity 0.87)
• Lost cochlear compression degrades speech formant coding in hearing-impaired listeners (similarity 0.86)
• Noise-damaged cochleas keep low-side suppression normal while high-side thresholds rise (similarity 0.85)
• Faster-fluctuating sounds trigger less cochlear compression, trading sensitivity for better dynamic encoding (similarity 0.85)
• Noise-induced hearing loss reduces neural suppression in proportion to tuning broadening (similarity 0.84)
• Cochlear hearing loss spares envelope processing but amplifies perceived fluctuation via recruitment (similarity 0.84)
• Loss of cochlear compression most harms speech recognition of intensity-attenuated syllables (similarity 0.84)
• Cochlear compression may protect AM detection against added background noise (similarity 0.83)
• Sensorineural hearing loss reduces contrast in F0-synchronized neural rates across frequency (similarity 0.83)
• Compression loss most impairs recognition when a syllable is relatively quieter than its neighbors. (similarity 0.83)
• Two-tone suppression reflects saturation of outer-hair-cell receptor currents. (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Hearing loss reduces cochlear suppression and compressive nonlinearity together #expands (0.85) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3878
• Loss of cochlear compression alone impairs hearing soft syllables amid louder ones #exemplifies (0.80) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 4046
• Lost cochlear compression degrades speech formant coding in hearing-impaired listeners #exemplifies (0.80)
• Broadened frequency tuning correlates with loss of suppression in auditory nerve fibers #corroborates (0.80) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3871
• Cochlear suppression includes an on-CF component preceding excitation #expands (0.75)