Irregular Speech Rate Dissociates Auditory Cortical Entrainment, Evoked Responses, and Frontal Alpha

Abstract

The entrainment of rhythmic auditory cortical activity to the speech envelope is considered to be critical for hearing. Previous work has proposed divergent views in which entrainment reflects either early evoked responses related to sound encoding or high-level processes related to expectation or cognitive selection. Using a manipulation of speech rate, we dissociated auditory entrainment at different time scales. Specifically, our results suggest that delta entrainment is controlled by frontal alpha mechanisms and thus support the notion that rhythmic auditory cortical entrainment is shaped by top-down mechanisms.