1999 — 2002 |
Eddins, David A |
R01Activity Code Description: To support a discrete, specified, circumscribed project to be performed by the named investigator(s) in an area representing his or her specific interest and competencies. |
Monaural and Binarual Spectro/Temporal Processing @ State University of New York At Buffalo
Description:(From the proposal) Characterization of normal and impaired auditory perception necessarily requires an understanding of how simple and complex auditory signals are perceived and encoded. A void in this area of research is a global or unifying framework with which to understand such processing as it relates to everyday communication in listeners with normal and impaired hearing. This proposal requests support for a comprehensive study focusing on the perception of spectral and temporal patterns characteristic of sounds in the natural environment. One long-term goal is to provide a global explanation of spectral and temporal envelope perception. One specific hypothesis to be tested here is that the perception of envelope changes (spectral or temporal) is consistent with a general set of physical constraints mediated by domain-specific envelope channels in the central auditory system. Two sets of channels are proposed, temporal and spectral, which are tuned to domain-specific envelope frequency and which reflect similar properties (e.g., position invariance) throughout the audio spectrum. It is also proposed that temporal envelope channels might exist that receive both monaural and binaural input. Because so many individuals with cochlear hearing impairment have difficulty processing complex sounds, but relatively little difficulty on many "local" tasks, it is crucial to understand the nature of these deficits and how (putative) domain-specific envelope channels might be affected. The experiments and analyses will provide a substantial contribution to the fields of hearing science, experimental psychology, and clinical audiology.
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0.905 |
2010 — 2014 |
Amuso, Vincent Borkholder, David Eddins, David |
N/AActivity Code Description: No activity code was retrieved: click on the grant title for more information |
Adaptive User-Guided Assistive Listening System @ Rochester Institute of Tech
PI: Borkholder, D. A., Amuso, V. J., Eddins, D. A. Proposal Number: 0967732
The research objective of this proposal is to test the hypothesis that an assistive listening system with dynamic, user-controlled directional characteristics will improve communication for the hearing impaired significantly relative to traditional fixed-directional systems. The proposed study will remove barriers to the delivery of acoustic information to people who are deaf or hard of hearing, enhancing their participation in education, work, and social settings, and improving their quality of life. Interfering speech, reverberation, and temporally-fluctuating background noise have a profound impact on speech perception for the hearing impaired. Directional microphone arrays have been shown to improve key metrics of speech intelligibility, especially for the hearing impaired, but minimal user guidance capabilities limit achievable benefits in multi-talker situations. It is widely accepted that current personal assistive listening systems are inadequate in small-group, multi-talker settings. The proposed research will explore user controlled directivity coupled with speaker identification algorithms and tracking techniques from the radar and infrared tracking communities to enable an advanced user-guided assistive listening system. Acoustic beamforming and parallel processing offer opportunities for users to control a focal acoustic zone while attenuating noise sources outside of this zone. A hybrid pattern recognition scheme incorporating several techniques for parameter extraction and speaker identification will allow robust dynamic identification of speakers in multi-talker situations. Target tracking algorithm will dynamically steer the acoustic focal zone as the talker moves through the meeting area, relieving the listener of the burden of manual tracking. A user interface will provide spatial information for each identified talker, allowing the listener to independently select the desired talker, or manually steer the acoustic beam to a desired location. The study will involve exploration of the most effective parameters for user-control, algorithms for phased-array beamforming, speaker identification, and target tracking for this acoustic application, and quantitative hypothesis testing with hearing impaired listeners in controlled environments. This will be a collaborative effort between the Rochester Institute of Technology College of Engineering, College of Science, the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, the International Center for Hearing and Speech Research, and the University of Rochester - Medical Center Department of Otolaryngology. The research will involve engineering graduate students, AALANA and women undergraduate students, and hearing impaired individuals from NTID, allowing a unique opportunity to foster an appreciation of technology to aid persons with disabilities. Intellectual Merit The novelty of the proposed research lies in the integration of technologies and approaches from different fields to address a critical need of the hearing impaired, and testing the hypothesis that a shift from technology-control to user-control of parameters enhances communication By incorporating speaker identification with target tracking and user-guidance of an acoustic focal zone, the technology is expected to outperform current state-of-the-art assistive listening systems in the small group, multi-talker circumstance in terms of speech intelligibility metrics. The investigators bring a distinctive combination of expertise in the areas of biomedical systems, radar, psychoacoustics and assistive listening devices, providing a unique opportunity for interdisciplinary innovation in technology to aid the hearing impaired. Broader Impacts The proposed research will improve the ability of hard-of-hearing individuals to participate in education, work and social settings by enabling a presently unavailable level of user control critical for the multitalker situation. It will enhance education opportunities for the hearing impaired and may allow more students to enter the STEM disciplines. Demonstration that user control of assistive listening device parameters enhances communication could have a profound impact on the philosophy and approaches for other assistive listening devices such as hearing aids and cochlear implants. The proposed activities integrate research with education for graduate and undergraduate engineering students, under-represented minorities, and hearing impaired individuals. The results will be broadly disseminated to the engineering and disability communities through conferences and journals, and will leverage the expertise of Center on Access Technology for integration into the educational mission of this and other universities.
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0.912 |
2013 — 2017 |
Eddins, David A. Shrivastav, Rahul [⬀] |
R01Activity Code Description: To support a discrete, specified, circumscribed project to be performed by the named investigator(s) in an area representing his or her specific interest and competencies. |
A Psychoacoustic Approach to Dysphonic Voice Quality Perception @ Michigan State University
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Voice disorders often lead to changes in voice quality noticed by patients, clinicians, and conversation partners, and improvement in voice quality is a critical outcome of treatment. However, we have limited knowledge of how people perceive voice quality. This has restricted our ability to accurately quantify or describe changes in qualit, such as due to a disease or when resulting from treatment. This continuation project combines concepts and techniques from voice science, speech science, hearing science, and engineering to address this problem. In general, the research proceeds by first obtaining high-precision measures of voice quality perception in the laboratory. These data are then used to develop mathematical models of voice quality perception that accurately reflect listeners' data. To obtain a close match between human judgments of voice quality and model output, models of auditory processing are used to obtain an internal representation of the voice acoustic signal. Specific measures are then captured from this internal auditory representation and used to model the perception of voice quality. Methods for obtaining perceptual judgments of single voice quality dimensions, the transformation of the acoustic signal to its internal representation, and the general form of the voice quality models have been completed for two different voice quality dimensions (breathiness and roughness) using simple stimuli (vowel /a/ as in hot). In the proposed work, these approaches will be developed further to establish a framework for comprehensive understanding of voice quality perception and to enable translation to clinical practice. These approaches will be (1) used to account for multiple, co-occurring voice quality dimensions; (2) applied to more natural and complex stimuli (multiple vowels and syllables); and (3) leveraged to understand other voice quality dimensions (strain). (4) To increase model accuracy and to expand their applicability to severely dysphonic voices (e.g. Type II and Type III), methods to estimate the pitch and pitch strength of dysphonic voices will be developed and incorporated into relevant models. (4) To enhance the measurement schemes in a manner that improves clinical utility, model output will be transformed to a scale that is intuitively relted to the perceptual magnitude of each voice quality dimension. This will create a set of intuitive voice quality metrics that are easy to use and interpret. (5) Finally, the feasibility of using thee models and metrics in regular clinical assessment will be evaluated through an initial clinical study.
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0.922 |
2016 — 2020 |
Eddins, David A. |
P01Activity Code Description: For the support of a broadly based, multidisciplinary, often long-term research program which has a specific major objective or a basic theme. A program project generally involves the organized efforts of relatively large groups, members of which are conducting research projects designed to elucidate the various aspects or components of this objective. Each research project is usually under the leadership of an established investigator. The grant can provide support for certain basic resources used by these groups in the program, including clinical components, the sharing of which facilitates the total research effort. A program project is directed toward a range of problems having a central research focus, in contrast to the usually narrower thrust of the traditional research project. Each project supported through this mechanism should contribute or be directly related to the common theme of the total research effort. These scientifically meritorious projects should demonstrate an essential element of unity and interdependence, i.e., a system of research activities and projects directed toward a well-defined research program goal. |
Project 1 - Research Audiology, Speech Perception, and Psychoacoustics @ University of South Florida
Project 1 ABSTRACT Our long-term goal is to ameliorate the debilitating consequences of age-related hearing loss (ARHL; presbycusis) that are known to impact nearly 70% percent of Americans over the age of 70. ARHL interferes with effective communication by reducing the audibility of sounds, and degrading the intelligibility of speech in quiet and noisy backgrounds. The overall objective of this research is to identify and understand effective methods for modulating ARHL. The central hypothesis of this is that targeted therapeutic interventions will induce plasticity within the peripheral and central auditory system, altering the function of complex gain mechanisms, leading to amelioration of chronic deficits that define presbycusis. This pioneering research uses innovative catalysts to induce functional changes in the aging auditory system. We will leverage cross-project comparative methods to identify the perceptual, neurophysiological, and molecular bases of the resulting peripheral and central auditory plasticity. Aim 1 focuses on the potential to use hormone (aldosterone) supplementation to improve peripheral and central auditory function. Aims 2 and 3 test a series of hypotheses that establish the nature and magnitude of neural plasticity in older adults induced by augmented acoustic environments (AAE). Targeted ARHL deficits include loudness growth, temporal processing, and speech in noise processing. A combination of behavioral and electrophysiological measures and a combination of longitudinal and cross-sectional designs will serve as the basis for the broader comparative research of this proposal. The comprehensive framework proposed here is the first to our knowledge combining basic and applied methods to address central auditory plasticity and the amelioration of AHRL in a manner that allows rapid translation of findings to clinical practice ? the foremost goal of NIA and NIH at large.
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0.958 |
2016 — 2017 |
Eddins, David A. Formby, Charles Craig |
R21Activity Code Description: To encourage the development of new research activities in categorical program areas. (Support generally is restricted in level of support and in time.) |
Toward a Transitional Intervention For Debilitating Hyperacusis @ University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa
ABSTRACT Among the most desperate and memorable patients for hearing health-care providers are those who suffer a debilitating intolerance to the loudness of everyday sounds. This classical condition, known as hyperacusis, presents a unique treatment challenge. These terribly debilitated individuals characteristically present in the clinic wearing earplugs and/or earmuffs to limit offending sound exposures, and commonly report withdrawal from routine daily activities, including those at work and home. In extreme cases, the problem may require psychological or psychiatric intervention to reduce the risk of suicide. The primary challenge for the clinician is to transition the debilitated patient out of sound-attenuating hearing protection (which when used for prolonged periods is counterproductive and may further exacerbate hyperacusis) and into a sound-enriching therapy to promote normal sound tolerance. The dilemma for the clinician, in the absence of an efficient and effective intervention strategy, is how best to facilitate the transition of the patient, who may often cling to sound protection, into productive sound-enriching treatment. We propose to attack this quandary with an extreme form of amplitude compression that has been advocated as an alternative to sound- attenuating protection for facilitating desensitization of debilitated hyperacusis patients. Our compression scheme will be implemented in bilateral customized combination hearing-aid/noise generator devices, deeply seated and acoustically sealed for maximum sound attenuation (offset by unity gain) within the ear canals. This device offers, in a single flexible instrument, a promising transitional intervention to sound-enriching therapy, replacing counterproductive sound-attenuating earplugs with loudness-suppressing compression processing that affords improved audibility and a broader dynamic range, ostensibly without opposing the therapeutic effects of enriching sound therapy. In this project, engineering, implementation, and validation of the compression processing device will be completed in Aim 1. In Aim 2, the device, used as a transitional tool to replace maladaptive hearing protection, will be assessed together with enriching sound therapy from noise generators in a repeated-measures within-subject design to track treatment effects and dynamics in patients with debilitating hyperacusis. The primary outcome measure to quantify the treatment effects will be change in loudness judgments measured longitudinally from start to end of the sound therapy treatment. The results from this high-impact research will guide and shape innovative sound-based interventions to streamline treatment and enhance the well-being and quality of life for severely affected hyperacusis patients.
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0.905 |
2020 — 2021 |
Dealarcon, Alessandro Eddins, David A. Shrivastav, Rahul (co-PI) [⬀] |
R01Activity Code Description: To support a discrete, specified, circumscribed project to be performed by the named investigator(s) in an area representing his or her specific interest and competencies. |
Pediatric Dysphonia: Multidisciplinary Advances to Improve Voice Quality Outcomes @ University of South Florida
ABSTRACT Childhood voice disorders can have profound influences on communication that in turn impact physical, cognitive, and emotional development. Surprising to many, the prevalence of pediatric voice disorders is high, yet systematic bench-to-bedside research targeting pediatric voice assessment is severely lacking. This innovative proposal seeks to advance our knowledge of the basic properties of pediatric dysphonia and to develop and improve laboratory methods and clinical protocols for quantifying pediatric voice quality (VQ). The proposal addresses three fundamental issues as yet unanswered. First and foremost, we challenge the tacit assumption that the primary dimensions of pediatric VQ, to be assessed, analyzed, and tracked, are the same across age and vibratory source. These assumptions have yet to be tested, though they permeate clinical practice and research, despite the fact that there are marked differences in the vocal anatomy and physiology between children and adults and between vibratory sources that can impact VQ. To this end, Aim 1 involves a systematic multidimensional scaling approach to establish the dominant voice qualities associated with glottal and supraglottal vibratory sources in pediatric dysphonia. Aim 2 explores the potential role of pitch perception to inform us about pediatric dysphonia and to better accommodate different vibratory sources. While standard VQ assessments do not distinguish among possible vibratory sources, experts anecdotally note very different source-dependent VQ. In doing so, we address the vexing problem posed by aperiodic signals (e.g., Type III) in pediatric voices with supraglottal sources by invoking recently developed, pitch-based measurement methods. In Aim 3, we use a theoretical framework of perception to quantify VQ along primary dimensions to support: 1) discovery of objective indices of VQ, 2) development of robust perceptual measures of VQ, and 3) development of novel ratio-level scales ideal for clinical use as diagnostic and outcome measures. Such scales enhance clinical perceptual evaluation of voice to support quantitative comparisons among pre-treatment, peri- treatment, and post-treatment outcomes to provide robust, evidenced-based outcome measures. The success of this proposal is bolstered by the uniquely qualified expert team that has been assembled. The team includes collaborators that are expert pediatric voice clinicians, led by Dr. Alessandro de Alarcon who is a foremost pediatric laryngologist, and a group with years of experience using innovative methods to investigate voice quality in adults, including Drs. David Eddins, Rahul Shrivastav, Supraja Anand, and Erol Ozmeral, with expertise in voice, speech, hearing, and signal processing. Together, this multi-disciplinary team has the knowledge, experience, expertise, and multi-site resources to efficiently and effectively address the limitations noted above. This pre-translational and translational research has the promise to substantially advance the field of pediatric voice and vocal heath care with the potential to lead to formal clinical trials.
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0.958 |
2021 |
Eddins, David A. Shrivastav, Rahul (co-PI) [⬀] |
R01Activity Code Description: To support a discrete, specified, circumscribed project to be performed by the named investigator(s) in an area representing his or her specific interest and competencies. |
A Comprehensive Psychoacoustic Approach to Voice Quality Perception @ University of South Florida
PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Voice disorders often lead to changes in voice quality noticed by patients, clinicians, and conversation partners. Assessment of voice quality is essential for diagnosis, and improvement in voice quality is a critical outcome of treatment. However, our knowledge of how voice quality is perceived is limited and the availability of robust measures of clinical outcome is even more limited. This has restricted our ability to accurately quantify or describe changes in quality, such as declines due to a disease or improvements resulting from treatment. This continuation project combines concepts and techniques from voice science, speech science, hearing science, and engineering to address these problems. The comprehensive approach to the proposed research simultaneously envelops the three primary VQ dimensions, embraces their covariance, improves measurement methods, and expands ecological validity through connected speech evaluation. The research proceeds by first obtaining high-precision measures of voice quality perception in the laboratory. These data are then used to develop mathematical models of voice quality perception that accurately reflect listeners? data. To obtain a close match between human judgments of voice quality and model output, models of auditory processing are used to obtain an internal representation of the voice acoustic signal. Specific measures are then captured from this internal auditory representation and used to model the perception of voice quality. In the proposed work, these methods will be used to establish a comprehensive framework for understanding and measuring voice quality perception and to enable translation to clinical practice. The specific goals of this project are to: (1) develop a more complete understanding of the nature of VQ covariance (among breathy, rough, and strain) using natural dysphonic voices; (2) assess VQ in connected speech at micro (segmental) and macro (whole utterance) levels to better capture the impacts of rapid and complex transitions, co- articulatory and prosodic variations, and unique VQ signatures related to specific pathologies; (3) incorporate all of these components into a novel, three-dimensional VQ scaling procedure that is simple, intuitive, efficient enough to be used clinically, and has ratio-level measurement properties; (4) use highly-predictive computational models to overcome many of the limitations of acoustic analyses and perceptual evaluation; and (5) evaluate full range of psychometric properties considered in test design and evaluation including reliability, validity, sensitivity, and specificity. Perhaps most importantly, the goal is to develop an assessment that accurately indicates responsiveness to change (i.e., disorder progression, treatment). These parameters are considered essential for longitudinal assessment and outcome measurement. The feasibility of using these models and metrics in regular clinical assessment will be evaluated in multiple voice pathologies through a clinical field-trial and coordinated offline assessments by clinicians and laboratory subjects.
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0.958 |