Open AccessThe Effects of Task Difficulty Predictability and Noise Reduction on Recall Performance and Pupil Dilation Responses
Author(s) -
Andreea Micula,
Jerker Rönnberg,
Lorenz Fiedler,
Dorothea Wendt,
Maria Cecilie Jørgensen,
Ditte Katrine Larsen,
Elaine Hoi Ning Ng
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
ear and hearing
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.577
H-Index - 109
eISSN - 1538-4667
pISSN - 0196-0202
DOI - 10.1097/aud.0000000000001053
Subject(s) - pupillometry , pupillary response , active listening , sentence , predictability , recall , task (project management) , speech recognition , psychology , audiology , computer science , cognitive psychology , pupil , natural language processing , communication , statistics , medicine , mathematics , management , neuroscience , economics
Communication requires cognitive processes which are not captured by traditional speech understanding tests. Under challenging listening situations, more working memory resources are needed to process speech, leaving fewer resources available for storage. The aim of the current study was to investigate the effect of task difficulty predictability, that is, knowing versus not knowing task difficulty in advance, and the effect of noise reduction on working memory resource allocation to processing and storage of speech heard in background noise. For this purpose, an "offline" behavioral measure, the Sentence-Final Word Identification and Recall (SWIR) test, and an "online" physiological measure, pupillometry, were combined. Moreover, the outcomes of the two measures were compared to investigate whether they reflect the same processes related to resource allocation.