A right-ear advantage (REA) is often observed in speech recognition, manifested by better performance compared to the left ear. Explanations for this usually relate to the mainly contralateral connection of the peripheral auditory system with the hemispheres in conjunction with a specialization of the left hemisphere for speech. There is evidence that the REA is increased under cognitive load (e.g. Penner et al., 2009). Therefore, it is interesting to investigate how the REA behaves in cocktail-party situations (i.e. multiple concurrent talkers), that are either static (constant target talker) or dynamic (unpredictable target talker changes), as the latter are associated with higher cognitive load. Results of a previous study (Wächtler et al., 2020) indeed provided some first evidence of a larger REA in dynamic relative to static situations, although ceiling effects limited the conclusiveness.

A cocktail-party situation with three competing talkers (positions: 0 and ±60 degrees) was simulated. In the static condition, the position of the target talker remained constant and was announced in advance, while it changed unpredictably in the dynamic situation. The speech stimuli were either presented at low sound pressure levels or processed with a noise vocoder. Sixteen young adults with normal hearing participated.

The dynamic condition was associated with a greater REA than the static situation. Also, processing stimuli with the vocoder yielded a higher REA than presentation at low levels.

The results are discussed against the background of common models of the REA.

References:

Penner et al. (2009): doi.org/10.1080/13803390902766895

Wächtler et al. (2020): doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8101983

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