Speaker: Professor Shuichi Sakamoto
Date: 25 February  2020
Time: 10.00am -11.00am
Location: Australian Hearing Hub, Level 1, Lecture Theatre

Abstract:
In everyday listening situations, we can extract specific acoustic information from a large number of surrounding sound sources. This phenomenon is often called the cocktail party effect. Auditory selective attention is an important mechanism underlying the cocktail party effect. By directing their attention to various acoustic properties of the target sound, listeners can hear out a target sound from distractors. This study investigated how the spatial and temporal characteristics of auditory selective attention affect speech understanding in the presence of competing speech sounds. The results of an experimental listening test showed the spread of auditory spatial attention according to direction. Moreover, the shape of spatial window of the auditory selective attention was almost same regardless of the direction in which listeners’ attention was directed. The results also indicated that the contribution of a spatial cue of auditory selective attention was greater than that of a temporal cue of auditory selective attention.

Bio:
Professor at Tohoku University (Sendai, Japan)
Visiting Professor, School of Engineering, Macquarie University

Registration:  Entry is free and open to the public.

Please contact: Jason Mikiel-Hunter if you have any further questions – jason.mikiel-hunter@mq.edu.au