Auditory research in developmental dyslexia proposes that deficient auditory processing of speech underlies difficulties with reading and spelling. Focusing predominantly on phonological processing, studies have not yet addressed the role of the speaker-related (indexical) properties of speech that enable the formation of phonological representations. Here, we assess auditory processing of indexical characteristics cueing a speaker's regional dialect and gender to determine whether dyslexia constraints recognition of dialect features and voice gender. Adults and children aged 11–14 years with dyslexia and their age-matched controls responded to 360 unique sentences extracted from spontaneous conversations of 40 speakers. In addition to the original unprocessed speech, there were two focused filtered conditions (using lowpass filtering at 400 Hz and 8-channel noise vocoding) probing listeners' responses to segmental and prosodic cues. Compared with controls, both groups with dyslexia were significantly limited in their abilities to recognize dialect features from either set of cues. The results for gender suggest that their comparatively worse gender recognition in the noise-vocoded condition was possibly related to poor temporal resolution. We propose that the deficient processing of indexical cues by individuals with dyslexia originates in peripheral auditory processes, of which impaired processing of relevant temporal cues in amplitude envelope is a likely candidate.

中文翻译：

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有和没有阅读障碍的儿童和成人对言语中的索引线索的感知：区域方言和性别认同

发展性阅读障碍的听觉研究表明，语音的听觉处理不足是阅读和拼写困难的基础。主要关注语音处理，研究尚未解决语音的说话者相关（索引）特性的作用，这些特性能够形成语音表征。在这里，我们评估提示说话者区域方言和性别的索引特征的听觉处理，以确定阅读障碍是否限制了方言特征和语音性别的识别。患有阅读障碍的 11 至 14 岁的成人和儿童及其年龄匹配的对照者对从 40 位说话者的自发对话中提取的 360 个独特句子做出反应。除了原始未处理的语音，有两个重点过滤条件（使用 400 Hz 的低通滤波和 8 通道噪声语音编码）探测听众对分段和韵律线索的反应。与对照组相比，两个阅读障碍组在从任一组线索中识别方言特征的能力上都受到了显着限制。性别的结果表明，他们在噪声声码条件下相对较差的性别识别可能与时间分辨率差有关。我们提出，阅读障碍个体对索引线索的处理不足源于外周听觉过程，其中振幅包络中相关时间线索的处理受损可能是候选者。两组患有阅读障碍的人从任何一组线索中识别方言特征的能力都受到了显着限制。性别的结果表明，他们在噪声声码条件下相对较差的性别识别可能与时间分辨率差有关。我们提出，阅读障碍个体对索引线索的处理不足源于外周听觉过程，其中振幅包络中相关时间线索的处理受损可能是候选者。两组患有阅读障碍的人从任何一组线索中识别方言特征的能力都受到了显着限制。性别的结果表明，他们在噪声声码条件下相对较差的性别识别可能与时间分辨率差有关。我们提出，阅读障碍个体对索引线索的处理不足源于外周听觉过程，其中振幅包络中相关时间线索的处理受损可能是候选者。