A Brain-Computer Interface for Improving Auditory Attention in Multi-Talker Environments

There is significant research in accurately determining the focus of a listener's attention in a multi-talker environment using auditory attention decoding (AAD) algorithms. These algorithms rely on neural signals to identify the intended speaker, assuming that these signals consistently reflect the listener's focus. However, some listeners struggle with this competing talkers task, leading to suboptimal tracking of the desired speaker due to potential interference from distractors. The goal of this study was to enhance a listener's attention to the target speaker in real time and investigate the underlying neural bases of this improvement. This paper describes a closed-loop neurofeedback system that decodes the auditory attention of the listener in real time, utilizing data from a non-invasive, wet electroencephalography (EEG) brain-computer interface (BCI). Fluctuations in the listener's real-time attention decoding accuracy were used to provide acoustic feedback. As accuracy improved, the ignored talker in the two-talker listening scenario was attenuated; making the desired talker easier to attend to due to the improved attended talker signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). A one-hour session was divided into a 10-minute decoder training phase, with the rest of the session allocated to observing changes in neural decoding. In this study, we found evidence of suppression of (i.e., reduction in) net neural tracking and decoding of the unattended talker when comparing the first and second half of the neurofeedback session (p = 0.02, Cohen's d = -1.29, 95% CI [-0.02, -0.01] and p = 0.01, Cohen's d = -1.56, 95% CI [-7.25, -3.44], respectively). We did not find a statistically significant increase in the neural tracking or decoding of the attended talker. These results establish a single session performance benchmark for a time-invariant, non-adaptive attended talker linear decoder utilized to extract attention from a listener integrated within a closed-loop neurofeedback system. This research lays the engineering and scientific foundation for prospective multi-session clinical trials of an auditory attention training paradigm.