A Whispered Christmas: Phonetic Expectations and Type of Masking-Noise Influence Auditory Verbal Hallucinations

Authors

  • Mark Scott Memorial University

Abstract

A Whispered Christmas: Phonetic Expectations and Type of Masking-Noise Influence Auditory Verbal Hallucinations

Auditory Verbal Hallucinations (AVH) are most commonly associated with schizophrenia, being one of the key diagnostic symptoms of the disease (Frith, 1992). However, AVH are not limited to people with schizophrenia, with c. 9.6% of people with no known psychological issues reporting this experience (van Slobbe-Maijer 2019). A common technique for inducing AVH is to present people with a masking noise and suggest the presence of sound under the noise. The most famous demonstration of this is the ‘White Christmas’ effect in which participants are played white noise and told to indicate when they hear the song "White Christmas" underneath the noise. Many participants report hearing the song, despite there being nothing in the audio signal but noise (Barber and Calverley, 1964). Several replications have demonstrated the effect with speech as well (e.g., Feelgood and Rantzen, 1994; Fernyhough et al., 2007; Hartley et al., 2017). Several modulators of the effect have been explored, including caffeine (Crowe et al. 2011), fantasy proneness (Merckelbach and van de Ven, 2001), and stress, (Hoskin et al., 2014).

The "White Christmas" effect induces hallucinations through masking and establishing sensory expectations. However, despite the extensive work on the effect there is little research on how the phonetic details of the sensory expectation influence the effect. Similarly, there is little research on how the type of masking noise influences the effect. The current experiments address this gap by examining two types of phonetic expectation (expecting modal speech versus expecting whispered speech) and two types of masking noise (multi-talker babble versus spectrally-matched speech-shaped noise). More AVH were reported for whispered than modal speech expectations and more AVH were reported for multi-talker babble than spectrally-matched speech-shaped noise; however there was no interaction found.

Additional Files

Published

2022-07-05

How to Cite

1.
Scott M. A Whispered Christmas: Phonetic Expectations and Type of Masking-Noise Influence Auditory Verbal Hallucinations. Canadian Acoustics [Internet]. 2022 Jul. 5 [cited 2024 May 1];50(3):88-9. Available from: https://jcaa.caa-aca.ca/index.php/jcaa/article/view/3832

Issue

Vol. 50 No. 3 (2022)

Section

Proceedings of the Acoustics Week in Canada

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