Timing is everything: Temporal processing deficits in the aged auditory brainstem

• Published in: Hearing research Vol. 264; no. 1; pp. 63 - 69
• Main Author: Walton, Joseph P.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 01.06.2010
• Subjects: Acoustic Stimulation; Age Factors; Aging; Animal models; Animals; Auditory Pathways - physiopathology; Brain Stem - physiopathology; Comprehension; Cues; Evoked Potentials, Auditory, Brain Stem; Hearing Loss - physiopathology; Hearing Loss - psychology; Humans; Models, Animal; Neural correlates; Noise - adverse effects; Perceptual Masking; Psychoacoustics; Signal Detection, Psychological; Speech Perception; Temporal resolution; Time Perception; B; Animal models; BF; FM; MGB; Neural correlates; CN; AM; WC; DCN; PB; PVCN; Aging; rMTF; BMF; IC; Temporal resolution; MGT; FC; AVCN; MTF; SAM; tMTF
• ISSN: 0378-5955; 1878-5891; 1878-5891
• DOI: 10.1016/j.heares.2010.03.002

This summary article reviews the literature on neural correlates of age-related changes in temporal processing in the auditory brainstem. Two types of temporal processing dimensions are considered, (i) static, which can be measured using a gap detection or forward masking paradigms, and (ii) dynamic, which can be measured using amplitude and frequency modulation. Corresponding data from physiological studies comparing neural responses from young and old animals using acoustic stimuli as silent gaps-in-noise, amplitude modulation, and frequency modulation are considered in relation to speech perception. Evidence from numerous investigations indicates an age-related decline in encoding of temporal sound features which may be a contributing factor to the deficits observed in speech recognition in many elderly listeners.