Lexical Tone Perception in Tone language--a fMRI Study

Sponsor

Chinese University of Hong Kong (Other)

Overall Status

Completed

CT.gov ID

NCT04135105

Collaborator

Prince of Wales Hospital, Shatin, Hong Kong (Other)

Enrollment

Location

31.5

Actual Duration (Months)

0.9

Patients Per Site Per Month

Study Details

Study Description

Brief Summary

Tone language refers to a language that uses fixed pitch pattern to distinguish words (Yip, 2002). Understanding the functional anatomy of the brain during lexical tone processing will provide useful hints for an effective intervention strategy such as brain stimulation. The present study investigate the cortical organisation of the brain in lexical tone perception of Cantonese speakers by the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).

Condition or Disease	Intervention/Treatment	Phase
Lexical Tone Neuroimaging Chinese Speech Perception	Other: Normal hearing group

Detailed Description

Tone language refers to a language that uses fixed pitch pattern to distinguish words (Yip, 2002). Cantonese is one of the main tone languages spoken by over 70 million around the world (Li et al.,1995; Adolfsson, 2010). Individuals with significant hearing impairment often present great difficulty in tone perception, affecting their understanding of words and hence, hamper their overall communication. The poor tone perception persists even with intensive auditory training coupled with advanced hearing technology such as cochlear implants.

Understanding the functional anatomy of the brain during lexical tone processing will provide useful hints for an effective intervention strategy such as brain stimulation. Researchers have been investigating the neural basis for tone perception in the past decades but failing to come to a consensus on the location of the brain that is responsible for lexical tone processing. The discrepant results may be due to the fact of the differences in subject selection (animals, healthy adults, brain-injured patients, tonal-language and non-tonal language speakers), testing materials and tasks employed (linguistic versus non-linguistic stimuli; dichotic listening versus discrimination and identification tasks) and outcome measurements (performance score, reaction time, accuracy rate, PET scan and fMRI).

Cortical organization, or brain mapping, refers to functional anatomy of the brain. The present study is the first study to systematically investigate the cortical organization of the brain in lexical tone perception of Cantonese speakers by the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). A comprehensive set of auditory stimuli specifically for investigating the different levels of lexical tone processing will be constructed. Native Cantonese speakers with normal hearing were recruited. They underwent fMRI while listening to the carefully designed auditory stimuli.

Once the cortical organization of lexical tone processing in Cantonese is identified, the valuable findings could be applied in further brain intervention procedures to tackle the long lasting, unresolved tone perception difficulty encountered by people with hearing impairment or other related disorders.

Study Design

Study Type:

Observational

Actual Enrollment :

29 participants

Observational Model:

Other

Time Perspective:

Other

Official Title:

Lexical Tone Perception in Tone Language speakers--a fMRI Study

Actual Study Start Date :

Feb 12, 2017

Actual Primary Completion Date :

Feb 25, 2018

Actual Study Completion Date :

Sep 30, 2019

Arms and Interventions

Arm	Intervention/Treatment
Normal hearing group Right-handed, normal hearing, no reported neurological disorders	Other: Normal hearing group Observational

Arm

Intervention/Treatment

Normal hearing group

Right-handed, normal hearing, no reported neurological disorders

Other: Normal hearing group

Observational

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcome Measures

Activation areas in the brain that are responsible for lexical tone perception [2015-2019]
To identify the activation area(s) in the brain that are responsible for lexical tone perception in normal hearing participants

Secondary Outcome Measures

Accuracy rate [2015-2019]
Accuracy rate of passive listening task
Reaction Time [2015-2019]
reaction time of passive listening task

Eligibility Criteria

Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study:

18 Years to 60 Years

Sexes Eligible for Study:

All

Accepts Healthy Volunteers:

Yes

Inclusion Criteria:

native Cantonese speaker
right-handed
normal hearing
no reported of neurological disorder

Exclusion Criteria:

neurological disorder
left-handed
hearing impairment

Contacts and Locations

Locations

	Site	City	State	Country	Postal Code
1	Prince of Wales Hospital	Hong Kong	Hong Kong	China

Sponsors and Collaborators

Chinese University of Hong Kong
Prince of Wales Hospital, Shatin, Hong Kong

Investigators

Principal Investigator: Yuet Sheung Lee, Professor, Chinese University of Hong Kong

Study Documents (Full-Text)

None provided.

More Information

Publications

None provided.

Responsible Party:

Kathy Y.S. LEE, Chief of Division of Speech Therapy, Chinese University of Hong Kong

ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:

NCT04135105

Other Study ID Numbers:

Lexical tone perception(fMRI)

First Posted:

Oct 22, 2019

Last Update Posted:

Jan 27, 2020

Last Verified:

Jan 1, 2020

Individual Participant Data (IPD) Sharing Statement:

Undecided

Plan to Share IPD:

Undecided

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated Drug Product:

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated Device Product:

Keywords provided by Kathy Y.S. LEE, Chief of Division of Speech Therapy, Chinese University of Hong Kong

Study Results

No Results Posted as of Jan 27, 2020