Auditory Neurosciences & Technology Lab

ANT Lab News

Auditory Neurosciences  & Technology Laboratory - NEWS

May 2, 2022: Greet Lertpoompunya wins Graduate Student Research Symposium Award in the category of Health and Life Sciences.

 

Greet Lertpoompunya has won the Graduate Student Research Symposium Award in the category of Health and Life Sciences and was recognized at the 2022 Student Research Award Luncheon for her research entitled "Head Orienting Behaviors during Simultaneous Speech Detection and Localization." She is currently working on projects investigating head orienting behaviors of normal-hearing and hearing-impaired listeners in their natural listening environment and how the assistive listening devices are contributing to their overall hearing success.

February 2, 2022: Greet Lertpoompunya publishes in J. Neurophysiology!

We are delighted to announce the publication of the “IACC project” in the prestigious Journal of Neurophysiology. The paper, entitled “Large group differences in binaural sensitivity are represented in pre-attentive responses from auditory cortex,” demonstrates a pre-cognitive neural basis for large individual differences in binaural task performance that have often been considered to be associated with not understanding the task rather than having a binaural hearing deficit. Greet’s data indicate that the essential binaural cues are poorly represented in the neural activity of some listeners, and the poor representation corresponds to poor behavioral performance on the binaural task. We congratulate Greet, who is a Ph.D. student, on her first Journal Publication!

 

December 12, 2021: Dr. Nathan Higgins received an Internal Award from the College of Behavioral and Community Sciences for his proposal entitled:                                  Functional spatial segregation in auditory scene analysis.

Funds from this grant will be used to study how the brain segregates auditory sources based on spatial cues using psychophysical and electrophysiological measurements.

 

November 19, 2021: Dr. Ann Eddins honored as ASHA Fellow!

Dr. Ann Eddins was awarded the prestigious honor of Fellow in the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. “The status of Fellow is retained for life and is one of the highest honors this professional organization can bestow. It recognizes professional or scientific achievement and is given to a member who has shown outstanding contribution to the professions-contributions that are significant and would be so regarded within and beyond one's community or state” (ASHA, N.D.). Dr. Eddins was honored for her outstanding contributions to teaching, administrative service, and service to related professional organizations. She was acknowledged at the 2021 ASHA Awards Ceremony, at which Captain Chesley B. (Sully) Sullenberger III was the keynote speaker and recipient of the 2021 Annie Glenn Award. He spoke as an advocate for people who stutter while denouncing bullying, especially by those at the highest levels of public visibility. We congratulate Ann on this career milestone and more importantly for the impact she continues to have on our field.

 

April 11, 2021: Dr. Sarah Bochat awarded Best Poster at the USF Research Symposium.

Dr. Sarah Bochat won an award for Best Poster at the USF Graduate Student Research Symposium in Behavioral and Community Sciences. Here poster was entitled “The Effect of Sound Therapy on Auditory Brainstem Function and Loudness Perception”. In the poster, she described research methodology for investigating neural plasticity in the central auditory system of younger and older adults. The award came with a $500 check for use to attend a future national or international research conference.

 

February 2, 2021: Dr. Erol Ozmeral selected for the 2021 ASHA Lessons for Success conference

Dr. Erol Ozmeral was selected to be a protégé participant for the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) Lessons for Success conference. This program aims to provide intensive training to a promising group of early career scientists in the areas of (a) grant preparation and funding opportunities, (b) development and management of a successful research program, and (c) advancement of professional competencies. With participants completing assignments prior to and during the conference, this grant-writing "boot camp" provides invaluable advice and guidance from senior faculty with strong histories of research funding.

 

April 15, 2020: ASSL Scientists Receive Pediatric Voice NIH R01 Award

In a new five-year project, titled “ Pediatric dysphonia: Multidisciplinary advances to improve voice quality outcomes”, Drs. David A. Eddins, Supraja Anand, Erol Ozmeral, and Jeff Williams will work with colleagues at UGA (Rahul Shrivastav) and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center (CCHMC) to better understand pediatric voice disorders. This is the first NIH-funded large-scale laboratory investigation of the voice quality associated with pediatric voice disorders that involve conventional voicing and voicing without the use of the vocal folds. We use principles of psychoacoustics, models based on auditory perception, and conventional acoustic analyses explore the perception of voice quality in two patient populations that differ in method of voice production.  The goal of this study is to launch a comprehensive framework for understanding pediatric voice quality and to develop and evaluation novel measurement and analysis methods. This $2.33M NIH-sponsored research study will begin June 1, 2020.

 

April 13, 2020: ASSL Scientists receive Journal of Voice Best Paper Award.

USF professors Drs. Supraja Anand and David A. Eddins received a 2019 Best Paper Award for the prestigeous Journal of Voice.  The Editorial board of the journal honored the paper entitlted  "Objective Indices of Perceived Vocal Strain" as the best paper in Speech Language Pathology/Vocal Pedagogy. The paper was coauthored by Drs. Lisa M. Kopf of Iowa State University and Rahul Shrivastav of the University of Georgia. Also see USF Awards.

 

February 13, 2020: Scientists Awarded U.S. Patent for Hyperacusis Treatment

Dr. David Eddins and Dr. Craig Formby of USF and Steve Armstrong of Soundsgood Labs in Burlington, ON were recently awarded U.S. Patent #10,582,286 entitled “Method for Treating Debilitating Hyperacusis.”  This patent is based on research sponsored by NIH R21DC015054.  The patent focuses on the design, software, hardware and associated counseling combined in a novel treatment for hyperacusis.  Hyperacusis is a condition in which patients have an abnormal sensitivity to everyday moderate and loud sounds.  This condition frequently co-exists with tinnitus (phantom sound perception) and hearing loss. It can be debilitating and almost always results in life-style changes that involve avoidance of potentially loud environments.  The new treatment method offers great promise for improved auditory function and quality of life in individuals who suffer from hyperacusis.  The treatment method combines patient-centered hyperacusis counseling, and device signal processing that provides hearing protection to assist the patient in avoiding loud sounds as needed, sound therapy designed to expand the auditory dynamic range and reduce the need for hearing protection, and amplification for use in overcoming hearing loss as needed. The ongoing NIH-sponsored research study is currently accepting qualified study participants with severe hyperacusis into a small-scale trial of the newly patented intervention. Future work is planned to bring the technology to consumers.

 

January 30, 2020: Publication of New Speech-in-Noise Test by ASSL 

Researchers in the ASSL (Drs. Erol Ozmeral, Eric Hoover, Patricia Gabbidon, and David Eddins) recently published a new article in the International Journal of Audiology, titled “Development of the Continuous Number Identification Test (CNIT): feasibility of dynamic assessment of speech intelligibility.” The CNIT is a novel speech-in-noise test capable of measuring speech recognition on multiple time scales that could be key to assessing dynamic changes in the environment or imposed acoustic variations, by hearing instruments, for example. The new test is highly customizable, and it is currently being used in a number of the ASSL studies sponsored by the NIH and industry partners. To learn more, you can find the full paper here.

 

December 1, 2019: Dr. Ozmeral awarded an Early Career Researcher award (R21)

In a new three-year project, titled “A multi-modal streaming approach to understanding aided speech perception in noise: discovering relationships between device limitations, perceptual abilities, and neuromodulation of feature coding”, Dr. Erol Ozmeral will seek to advance our understanding of neural patterns associated with hearing-aid use. Hearing aids are designed to improve communication by reducing gain at spatial locations away from relevant speech, but not all listeners benefit from this imprecise strategy. In this study, we investigate the effects of directional processing on speech perception in noise using a three-pronged approach that systematically controls hearing aid digital signal processing, assays relevant behavioral measures, and discovers the neural processes affected by aided listening. The goal of this study is to launch a comprehensive framework for hearing aid evaluation and development grounded in established models of hearing and neuroscience. This NIH-sponsored research study is currently accepting qualified study participants

 

July 24, 2019: Drs. David and Ann Eddins were co-organizers of GreenFest 2019.

GreenFest 2019 was officially entitled Contemporary Hearing Science Inspired by David M. Green and was sponsored by the Knowles Hearing Center at Northwestern University. Dr. David M. Green is a pioneer in the fields of psychoacoustics and signal detection theory.  In addition to many discoveries, Dr. Green shaped the way many leading sciencists view the topic of auditory perception and his cadre of students and post-docs including many leading scientists.  Drs. David (former student) and Ann (former post-doc) Eddins served on the organizing committee with other Green students (Dr. Jungmee Lee) and post-docs (Drs. Beverly Wright, Elizabeth Strickland, and Robert Lutfi). Together, they assembled 20 invited speakers representing colleagues, students, and post-docs of Dr. Green.  Each presentation focused on an area of research impacted by the interactions between the speaker and Dr. Green. The two-day event had over 100 attendees and was highlighted by a question and answer session with Dr. Green.

 

July 1, 2019: Dr. Ann Eddins is Elected President of CAPCSD!

Dr. Ann Eddins has been elected as president of the Council of Academic Programs in Communication Sciences & Disorders (CAPCSD).  CAPCSD is "dedicated to promoting academic excellence, visionary leadership, and collaboration among communication sciences and disorders academic programs. Please take the opportunity to explore the many resources CAPCSD provides for member programs." 

There are over 300 member-programs from around the world and each year the annual conference hosts over 500 faculty-adminstrators from those programs. CAPCSD sponsors a graduate admissions portal (CSDCAS), provides eLearning courses, sponsors graduate studnet scholarships, and provides a variety of leadership and learning programs. We are excited that Dr. Eddins is leading this prestigous organzation into the new decade!

 

May 13, 2019: Erol Ozmeral and Katie Palandrani ASA Travel Awards!

Congratulations to Erol and Katie! Katie received the ASA Student Travel Subsidy and Erol received Early Career Travel Award to attend the 2019 Acoustical Society of America’s 177th Meeting in Louisville, KY, May 13-17. The list of ASSL presentations is below, featuring the Podium Presentation by Dr. Erol Ozmeral.

List:

• "Cortical effects on spatial tuning to speech in background babble," Erol J. Ozmeral, Katherine Palandrani, David A. Eddins, and Ann C. Eddins
• Challenging standard practices in adaptive psychophysics. Eric C. Hoover, Frederick J. Gallun, and David A. Eddins
• The effects of modulator shape and methods for expressing modulation depth on spectral modulation detection thresholds. Sittiprapa Isarangura, Katherine Palandrani, Trevor Stavropoulos, Aaron Seitz, Eric C. Hoover, Frederick J. Gallun, and David A. Eddins
• Interactions among perceived breathiness, roughness, and overall severity of dysphonia. David A. Eddins, Supraja Anand, and Rahul Shrivastav

 

May 8. 2019. Dr. Ann Eddins Presents Exciting Data on Central Auditory Plasticity!

Dr. Eddins attended the International Hearing Loss Conference in Niagara-On-The-Lake Ontario.  She presented a summary of recent research results on physiological measures of central auditory plasticity following short-term use of earplugs and ear-level sound generators.  This work was funded by NIH NIA P01AG009524.

 

April 15, 2019: New Research Project Focused on Movement and Hearing Aids (Sonova)

We are excited to begin a new three-year research project focused on the integration of head and body movement and hearing aid signal processing.  This research is funded by Sonova and is a collaboration between the ASSL and Sonova including teams at Phonak and Unitron.

 

March 26, 2019: David Eddins receives USF Outstanding Faculty Award

Dr. David A. Eddins was honored with a 2019 USF Outstanding Faculty Award for his research activities in 2019, including being inducted into the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) and research productivity through extramural funding and research publications.

 

January 25, 2019: Welcome, Research Coordinator Jennifer Pedraza & Audiologist Carrie Secor!

We are pleased to welcome Jennifer Pedraza to the ASSL! As Research Coordinator, Jennifer will help with research projects, administrative duties, participant recruitment, communications, marketing, and more!

Welcome, Jennifer!  We also are pleased to welcome Dr. Carrie Secor to the ASSL! As a Research Audiologist, Carrie will help with research projects,   and more! Welcome, Carrie!

November 15, 2018: Sittiprapa “Pound” Isarangura- ASHA Travel Awards!

Congratulations to Sittiprapa "Pound" Isarangura! She received the Audiology/Hearing Science Research Travel Award (ARTA) to attend the 2018 ASHA Convention in Boston, Massachusetts, November 15–17. With this award, she was able to attend the conference, facilitate networking opportunities, and further their understanding of audiology research.  

 

July 31, 2018: Welcome, Rob Budinsky, Au.D. Research Audiologist!

We are pleased to welcome Dr. Rob Budinsky to the ASSL! As Research Audiologist, Dr. Budinsky will contribute his expertise to our current research projects focused on hearing enhancement technologies! Welcome, Dr. Budinsky!

 

July 9, 2018: Welcome, Erika Boone - Research Support Specialist!

We are pleased to welcome Erika Boone to the ASSL! As Research Coordinator, Erika will help with research projects, administrative duties, participant recruitment, communications, marketing, and more! Welcome, Erika!

 

May 1, 2018: Welcome, Melissa Carlson - Research Coordinator! 

We are pleased to welcome Melissa Carlson to the ASSL! As Research Coordinator, Melissa will help with research projects, administrative duties, participant recruitment, communications, marketing, and more! Welcome, Melissa! 

April 9, 2018: Dr. Eddins elected to AIMBE College of Fellows!

"The American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering recognizes excellence in advancing innovation." Dr. David Eddins was elected in recognition of his achievements in advancing hearing technologies and his contributions to the fields of auditory perception, hearing loss, and voice quality perception. This is one of the highest professional distinctions for biomedical and medical engineers. Way to go, Dr. Eddins! 

November 17, 2017: Drs. Brotheron & Hutchison- ASHA Travel Awards!

Congratulations to Dr. Hannah Brotherton and Dr. Peter Hutchison! They each received an Audiology/Hearing Science Research Travel Award (ARTA) to attend the 2017 ASHA Convention in Los Angeles, CA from November 9-11. With these awards, they were able to attend the conference, facilitate networking opportunities, and further their understanding of audiology research.


October 19, 2017: Dr. Eddins- Faculty Research Award!

A big congratulations to Dr. David A. Eddins on receiving a 2017 Faculty Outstanding Research Achievement Award! On October 23, he along with other top researchers at USF will be celebrated for their achievements in research, scholarship, publications, awards, and grants. Dr. Eddins is recognized for his accomplishments in 2016 which include five funded research projects, eight new research grant proposals (seven to NIH and one to industry), four new research grants, three journal publications, ten conference presentations, all while serving as the President of the Florida Chapter of the Acoustical Society of America. Congrats, Dr. Eddins!!



July 14, 2017: Farewell Dr. Mark Skowronski.

Dr. Skowronski, a researcher and member of the lab since March 2015, will be transitioning to a new position outside of academia. His skills and expertise in signal processing are taking him to the next stage of his career, but will be greatly missed in the lab. Best of luck, Mark!!!



June 5, 2017: Welcome Dr. Kate Wadlinger, Dr. Mitch Aquilina, & Dr. Jennifer Aranda-Cordero!

We are pleased to welcome three new members to our team. Dr. Wadlinger, a graduate of Vanderbilt University, is one of our newest research audiologists. Dr. Aquilina, who received his Au.D. from the University of Florida, is also a research audiologist. In addition, Dr. Aranda, also a UF graduate, is enrolled in the Ph.D. program under the direction of Drs. Dave and Ann Eddins. Welcome to the ASSL!



April 3, 2017: Dr. Hoover: Dissertation study now in print!

Congratulations to Dr. Eric Hoover, ASSL postdoctoral fellow, on the publication of his primary dissertation study in the Journal of the American Academy of Audiology! The manuscript is entitled, "Auditory and Cognitive Factors Associated with Speech-in-Noise Complaints following Mild Traumatic Brain Injury."

In this study, Dr. Hoover, and his coauthors and dissertation advisors, Pamela Souza, Ph.D. CCC-A and Frederick (Erick) Gallun, Ph.D., tested the hypothesis that speech-in-noise complaints following mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) are due to deficits in temporal coding in the auditory system. This hypothesis counters the prevailing claim that auditory deficits after TBI are a symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder, which affects hearing through top-down mechanisms such as memory and attention. To test this hypothesis, they recruited participants with a history of mild TBI and compared them to age- and hearing-matched controls with no history of injury on a battery of auditory and cognitive tests. Consistent with previous studies, participants in the mild TBI group were more likely to perform poorly relative to controls on auditory tasks. Results showed that subjective speech-in-noise complaints were consistent with objective tests of both monaural and binaural speech understanding in noise. The findings were consistent with the general hypothesis that auditory complaints following mild TBI are related to dysfunction specific to bottom-up auditory processes, but more work will be needed to evaluate the role of temporal coding.

In the Auditory & Speech Sciences Laboratory, Dr. Hoover continues work in the area of auditory rehabilitation following TBI. This work includes the development of a portable, rapid assessment battery for use in research and clinical settings in collaboration with Dr. Gallun at the Portland VA Medical Center and Oregon Health and Science University as well as Dr. Aaron Seitz at the University of California, Riverside. This work is supported by a translational R01 from the National Institutes of Health. In addition to the assessment of auditory deficits following TBI, the Auditory & Speech Sciences Laboratory is partnered with Creare, Inc. in the development and validation of a rehabilitation program targeting this population. This work is supported by a contract from the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command.



October 3, 2016: World Congress of Audiology

ASSL co-directors, Drs. David and Ann Eddins, recently attended the 33rd World Congress of Audiology, a biennial meeting of the International Society of Audiology. The conference was held in Vancouver, Canada from September 18-21. Bringing together top hearing scientists from over 40 countries, the WCA provided opportunities to collaborate and enhance knowledge for future clinical practices and research endeavors. With 28 feature sessions and over 200 contributed talks and posters, the meeting was a great success!

Dr. Ann Eddins' feature sessions included two presentations: "Relating perceptual deficits in older adults to dynamic changes in cortical processing" and "Beyond the audiogram: Characterizing clinical attributes of the genetics of age-related hearing loss." Dr. David Eddins presented, "Waves of the future: automated and remote audiologic service delivery" during his feature session. 

More information about the World Congress of Audiology can be found here.



August 23, 2016: Welcome, Dr. Supraja Anand!

The ASSL welcomes Dr. Supraja Anand to USF! Dr. Anand is an Assistant Professor within the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. In collaboration with Drs. David Eddins and Mark Skowronski, she investigates dysphonic voice quality perception. Dr. Supraja Anand earned her undergraduate and master's degrees in the field of Communication Sciences and Disorders from All India Institute of Speech and Hearing, Mysore, India, and a Ph.D. in Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences from University of Florida, Gainesville. Her prior research/teaching experience includes a postdoctoral fellowship at Boston University and a 2 year stint as an Assistant Professor in Communication Sciences and Disorders at the West Chester University of Pennsylvania. Her research focuses on examining the effects of aging and neuromotor diseases (e.g. Parkinson's disease) on speech and voice characteristics.



June 17, 2016: A new project is underway at the ASSL!

For the vast majority of people with hearing loss, treatment decisions are based primarily on a basic audiological assessment including case history, otoscopy, evaluation of middle ear status, and hearing thresholds or audiogram. The audiogram measures the performance of the auditory system at the threshold of hearing, but the sounds that are important in people's lives are often at much higher levels. The most common auditory complaint is difficulty understanding speech in a noisy environment, such as a family gathering. The goal of this project is to develop auditory assessments that measure how listeners are able to encode and process sounds that are clearly audible. The development of these new assessments leverages our current understanding of auditory neuroscience, computational modeling, and psychoacoustics to create efficient tests for clinical diagnosis. The new test battery will expanding our understanding of central auditory dysfunction and support novel diagnostic and treatment approaches.

The project consists of four stages. In the first stage, psychometric properties of various laboratory measures will be assessed to determine the best assessment of a given dysfunction and the most efficient method to administer each test on a table device platform. The second stage consists of the development of an application platform for tablet computers, supporting the controlled administration of a battery of tests in a variety of experimental and clinical environments. Stage three consists of the evaluation of each test in the battery on a large number of young listeners with healthy hearing. This will establish normative ranges for each test and provide data that will be useful in computational models of auditory processing. Finally, stage four consists of the deployment of the assessment battery in two groups of listeners for whom the audiogram is a poor predictor of difficulty understanding speech in a noisy environment: older patients and those with a history of traumatic brain injury.

The long-term goal of this research is to bridge the gap between current theory in auditory neuroscience and clinical standard of care by creating tests that efficiently characterize central auditory dysfunction. Information gained in this study will be used as a foundation for the development and evaluation of novel treatments and provide a platform for large-scale clinical research projects.

February 2, 2016: Recently published articles by the ASSL team!

Ozmeral, E.J., Eddins, A.C., Frisina, D.R., Eddins, D.A. (2016). "Large cross-sectional study of presbycusis reveals rapid progressive decline in auditory temporal acuity," Neurobiology of Aging.

The auditory system relies on extraordinarily precise timing cues for the accurate perception of speech, music, and object identification. Epidemiological research has documented the age-related progressive decline in hearing sensitivity that is known to be a major health concern for the elderly. While smaller investigations indicate that auditory temporal processing also declines with age, such measures have not been included in larger studies. Temporal gap detection thresholds (TGDTs; an index of auditory temporal resolution) measured in 1071 listeners (18 to 98 years of age) were shown to decline at a minimum rate of 1.05 ms (15%) per decade. Age was a significant predictor of TGDT when controlling for audibility (partial correlation) and when restricting analyses to persons with normal hearing sensitivity (n = 434). The TDGTs were significantly better for males (3.5 ms; 51%) than females when averaged across the life span. These results highlight the need for indices of temporal processing in diagnostics, as treatment targets, and as factors in models of aging.

Eddins, D.A., Anand, S., Camacho, A., Shrivastav, R. (2016). "Modeling of Breathy Voice Quality Using Pitch Strength Estimates," Journal of Voice. doi:10.1016/j.jvoice.2015.11.016. Click for article.

Background: The characteristic voice quality of a speaker conveys important linguistic, paralinguistic, and vocal health-related information. Pitch strength refers to the salience of pitch sensation in a sound and was recently reported to be strongly correlated with the magnitude of perceived breathiness based on a small number of voice stimuli.
Objective: The current study examined the relationship between perceptual judgments of breathiness and computational estimates of pitch strength based on the Aud-SWIPE (P-NP) algorithm for a large number of voice stimuli (330 synthetic and 57 natural).
Methods and Results: Similar to the earlier study, the current results confirm a strong relationship between estimated pitch strength and listener judgments of breathiness such that low pitch-strength values are associated with voices that have high perceived breathiness. Based on this result, a model was developed for the perception of breathy voice quality using a pitch-strength estimator. Regression functions derived between the pitch-strength estimates and perceptual judgments of breathiness obtained from matching task revealed a linear relationship for a subset of the natural stimuli. We then used this function to obtain predicted breathiness values for the synthetic and the remaining natural stimuli.
Conclusions: Predicted breathiness values from our model were highly correlated with the perceptual data for both types of stimuli. Systematic differences between the breathiness of natural and synthetic stimuli are discussed.

January 19, 2016: New Au.D. Students Join Research Projects

Doctor of Audiology students, Brianna Kinney, and Kelsey Harris have recently joined the ASSL lab as research assistants. They will be mentored by Dr. Ozmeral, Dr. Hoover, and Drs. Eddins throughout the completion of their Audiology Doctoral Project, a requirement for earning the Doctor of Audiology degree from the University of South Florida.

December 23, 2015: The ASSL team has a new publication (online first) in The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America!

Eddins, D. A., Kopf, L. M., Shrivastav, R. (2015). "The psychophysics of roughness applied to dysphonic voice," J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 138, 6. doi: 10.1121/1.4937753. Click for article.

Roughness is a sound quality that has been related to the amplitude modulation characteristics of the acoustic stimulus. Roughness also is considered one of the primary elements of voice quality associated with natural variations across normal voices and is a salient feature of many dysphonic voices. It is known that the roughness of tonal stimuli is dependent on the frequency and depth of amplitude modulation and on the carrier frequency. Here, it is determined if similar dependencies exist for voiced speech stimuli. Knowledge of such dependencies can lead to a better understanding of the acoustic characteristics of vocal roughness along the continuum of normal to dysphonic and may facilitate computational estimates of vocal roughness. Synthetic vowel stimuli were modeled after talkers selected from the Satloff/Heman-Ackah disordered voice database. To parametrically control amplitude modulation frequency and depth, synthesized stimuli had minimal amplitude fluctuations, and amplitude modulation was superimposed with the desired frequency and depth. Perceptual roughness judgments depended on amplitude modulation frequency and depth in a manner that closely matched data from tonal carriers. The dependence of perceived roughness on amplitude modulation frequency and depth closely matched the roughness of sinusoidal carriers as reported by Fastl and Zwicker [(2007) Psychoacoustics: Facts and Models, 3rd ed. (Springer, New York)].

October 26, 2015: Conference Presentations: ASC & CAA 2015

ASSL co-directors, David A. Eddins and Ann C. Eddins, were invited to speak at the Indiana University Aging and Speech Communication Research Conference and the Canadian Academy of Audiology Annual Conference and Exhibition this month!

ASC 2015

• Eddins, D.A., and Eddins, A.C. (2015). "Emerging therapeutics targeting deficits of presbycusis," Indiana Aging and Speech Conference.

CAA 2015

• Eddins, D.A., and Eddins, A.C. (2015). "Auditory Dysfunction and Remediation Associated with Everyday Listening of Older Adults," Canadian Academy of Audiology.

• Eddins, D.A., and Eddins, A.C. (2015). "Physiological Mechanisms Associated with Binaural Processing Deficits in Older Adults," Canadian Academy of Audiology.
  
  

 July 23, 2015: Farewell to Arianna!

We bid farewell to Arianna Vera Rodriguez as she embarks on a new chapter in her education. She will be moving to Texas to pursue a Master's Degree in Speech-Language Pathology at the University of Texas at Austin. After serving for 3 years in the lab as an undergraduate at USF, her skills and experience will be sorely missed.
Best wishes Arianna!!!

July 20, 2015: New Au.D. Students Join Research Projects

The following Doctor of Audiology students have recently joined the ASSL lab as research assistants: Samuel Bernhisel, Patricia Gabbidon, and Spruha Mahapatra. They will be mentored by Dr. Ozmeral, Dr. Hoover, and Drs. Eddins throughout the completion of their capstone research projects, a requirement for earning the Doctor of Audiology degree from the University.

May 9, 2015: Dr. David Eddins Named UNC Distinguished Alumnus

Chapel Hill, North Carolina: Dr. David A. Eddins (UNC MS Audiology Class of '88) was honored by the Division of Speech and Hearing Sciences as a Distinguished Alumnus at their annual graduation ceremony at the William Friday Center on Saturday, May 9th 2015. He also delivered the commencement address during the ceremony. Dr. Eddins was introduced by a former undergraduate student at Indiana University and current UNC faculty member, Dr. Lauren Calandruccio. Dr. Eddins will be featured in the DSHS Summer 2015 Newsletter. Dr. Eddins noted the following:

"It was a thrill to receive this honor from my alma mater. I have been inspired by the terrific faculty in SHS. I developed a profound interest in speech and hearing as a UNC undergraduate student and a passion for research as a UNC graduate student. I can trace my professional roots to the program founders and continue to be inspired by current SHS faculty and students. Like UNC athletics, the UNC SHS tradition is strong and means a lot to me."

April 9, 2015: Dr. Eric Hoover Review Article Published

A review article written by our own Eric Hoover, along with Pamela E. Souza, and Frederick J. Gallun titled Competing Views on Abnormal Auditory Results After Mild Traumatic Brain Injury, was published in the April edition of the ASHA Publication SIG 6 Perspectives on Hearing and Hearing Disorders: Research and Diagnostics, April 2015, Vol. 19, 12-21. doi:10.1044/hhd19.1.12

Traumatic brain injury affects the lives of millions of Americans. Within audiology, there is general agreement that mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI) can result in long-term auditory processing deficits. However, this agreement is not shared across disciplines. In this paper, recent studies on the effects of MTBI on auditory function are reviewed in the context of competing opinions on the interpretation of neurosensory deficits after MTBI. Three hypotheses are presented that explain auditory test results as they relate to post-traumatic stress disorder, subtle cognitive deficits resulting from MTBI, and physiological damage to temporal processing in the auditory system.