Detection of 1st- and 2nd-order temporal-envelope cues in a patient with left superior cortical damage

This psychophysical study explores the extent to which the auditory cortex is necessary for various aspects of temporal-envelope perception, that is, perception of the slow temporal modulations in amplitude known to be crucial for sound identification. The ability to detect 1st- and 2nd-order sinusoidal amplitude modulation (AM) is evaluated in a single patient showing left-hemisphere damage encroaching the primary and secondary auditory cortices. Here, 1st- and 2nd-order AM refer to (1) sinusoidal variation in the amplitude of a 2 kHz pure tone, and (2) sinusoidal variation in the depth of a 64 Hz AM applied to the 2 kHz pure tone, respectively. The results replicate previous findings by showing that damage to the left auditory cortex results in a selective deficit in auditory sensitivity to the lowest 1St-order AM (i.e., 1st-order AM frequencies < 16 Hz). Moreover, a dissociation is apparent between the ability to detect 1st- and 2nd-order temporal-envelope cues. The patient shows poorer than normal ability to detect 2nd-order AM at low frequencies ranging from 4-23 Hz, but normal ability to detect the high (64 Hz) 1st-order AM carrying these 2nd-order modulations. This result indicates that damage to the left primary and secondary auditory cortices affects the ability to detect temporal variations in the local properties of sounds(such as AM depth). It is also consistent with the idea that, as in vision, central nonlinear mechanisms are involved in the computation of such local (or 2nd-order) temporal properties.