The role of age and executive function in auditory category learning

Abstract

Auditory categorization is a natural and adaptive process that allows for the organization of high-dimensional, continuous acoustic information into discrete representations. The aim of this study is two-fold: (a) to examine the developmental trajectory of rule-based auditory category learning from childhood through early adulthood, and (b) to examine the extent to which individual differences in rule-based category learning relates to individual differences in executive function. Sixty participants with normal-hearing, 20 children (age range, 7–12), 20 adolescents (age range, 13–19), and 20 young adults (age range, 20–23), learned to categorize novel spectrotemporally modulated sounds using trial-by-trial feedback. The experimental design included six blocks of 100 stimuli for a total of 600 trials. Results revealed that auditory categorization accuracy improved with age, with young adults outperforming children and adolescents. Computational modeling analyses indicated that the use of the task-optimal s...