Increasing sensorineural hearing loss shifts tone perception from fine structure to envelope cues

Evidence

It has been demonstrated that FS is also important for lexical tone perception in listeners with sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL), but as their hearing loss becomes more severe, their ability to use FS becomes degraded so that their lexical tone perception relies increasingly on E rather than FS cues (Wang et al. 2011 ). The reduced frequency selectivity may underlie the impaired ability to process FS information for SNHL listeners. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3380

Mandarin Chinese is a tone language with four phonologically distinctive tones that are characterized by syllable-level fundamental frequency (F0) contour patterns. … Previous studies have demonstrated that E is sufficient for speech perception (Shannon et al. 1995 ; Apoux et al. 2013 ), while FS is important for pitch perception (Smith et al. 2002 ) and lexical tone perception (Xu and Pfingst 2003 ). … It has been demonstrated that FS is also important for lexical tone perception in listeners with sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL), but as their hearing loss becomes more severe, their ability to use FS becomes degraded so that their lexical tone perception relies increasingly on E rather than FS cues (Wang et al. 2011 ). — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3381

Categorization

• QUESTION: Worth chasing: is the mechanism truly reduced frequency selectivity degrading FS processing, and does that causal chain replicate in ANSD listeners whose frequency selectivity is normal but temporal synchrony is impaired?
• corroborated: 4 independent passages support this claim — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3380; Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3381
• XREF: connects to: Amplitude-modulated tones gain an extra detection cue that noise and FM tones lack; Hearing loss widens critical bands and alters music perception itself — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 1897; Inner-ear damage permanently corrupts higher-level auditory perception, not just thresholds — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 1879 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• Fine structure dominates lexical tone perception in normal hearing but is lost in ANSD #corroborates (0.92)
• Sensorineural hearing loss damages pitch, harming speech-in-noise communication #expands (0.78) — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1324
• Sloping or rising hearing loss can create contradictory pitch codes across frequency regions #complicates (0.78)
• Hearing loss severity drives listeners toward alternative acoustic cues for arousal #expands (0.74) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 1377