BRAIN-LESIONS, CENTRAL MASKING, AND DICHOTIC SPEECH-PERCEPTION

A dichotic CV syllables task and an auditory central masking task were administered to 10 right hemisphere stroke, 10 left hemisphere stroke, and 10 age-matched controls. When data for all subjects were considered within and across groups, it was found that lateralized performance measures for dichotic listening and central masking were highly correlated (r =. 647, p <. 05 for controls; r =. 810, p <. 005 for R-CVA; r =. 648, p <. 05 for L-CVA; r =. 833, p <. 0001 for all subjects). The data suggest that some aspects of dichotic performance that have been previously attributed to changes in verbal processing are more adequately explained as being the result of a general binaural asymmetry of auditory perception. © 1994 Academic Press. All rights reserved.