Helen E Nuttall

• BA, MA, MSc, PhD
• Lecturer at Lancaster University/University College London

Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the associations between socioeconomic and lifestyle factors and measures of hearing ability to better understand potential risk factors for hearing loss. Insights from this research could help audiologists identify high-risk demographics, and ultimately contribute to addressing inequalities in hearing he...

Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the associations between socioeconomic and lifestyle factors and measures of hearing ability to better understand potential risk factors for hearing loss. Insights from this research could help audiologists identify high-risk demographics, and ultimately contribute to addressing inequalities in hearing he...

Previous research has shown that word-finding difficulties in older age are associated with functional and structural brain changes. Functional brain networks, measured through electroencephalography, reflect the brain’s neurophysiological organisation. However, the utility of functional brain networks, to predict word-finding in older and younger...

The increased multisensory integration and weaker attentional control experienced by older adults during audiovisual processing can result in inaccurate perceptions of their dynamic, everyday environment. These inaccurate representations of our environment can contribute to increased fall risk in older adults. A neural correlate of the attentional...

Purpose In difficult listening conditions, the visual system assists with speech perception through lipreading. Stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) is used to investigate the interaction between the two modalities in speech perception. Previous estimates of audiovisual benefit and SOA integration period differ widely. A limitation of previous research...

Purpose. In March 2020, a unique situation unfolded wherein the UK government announced social restriction measures to reduce the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19. Various remained in place until April 2021, with older adults, who were considered clinically vulnerable, being placed under stricter restrictions. This study aimed to determine...

Previous research has shown that word-finding difficulties in older age are associated with functional and structural brain changes. However, the use of functional brain networks, measured through electroencephalography, to predict word-finding in older and younger adults has not yet been investigated. This study utilised resting-state electroencep...

Multi-sensory integration is a core aspect of stable self-awareness however it known that this has a propensity to breakdown leading to aberrant experiences (such as hallucinations, distortions, aberrant body experiences). Limb immobilisation has been associated with decrease in corticomotor efficiency and atypical multi-sensory integration. The pr...

Speech motor resources may be recruited to assist challenging speech perception in younger normally hearing listeners, but the extent to which this occurs for older adult listeners is unclear. We investigated if speech motor resources are also recruited in older adults during speech perception. Specifically, we investigated if suppression of speech...

Purpose In March 2020, the U.K. government announced that people should isolate to reduce the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19. Outside a pandemic, psychosocial factors, such as socialization and mental health, may impact the relationship between hearing loss and increased dementia risk. We aim to report the impact of psychosocial factors,...

During multisensory integration, the time range within which visual and auditory information can be perceived as synchronous and bound together is known as the temporal binding window (TBW). With increasing age, the TBW becomes wider, such that older adults erroneously, and often dangerously, integrate sensory inputs that are asynchronous. Recent r...

Multisensory integration is essential for the quick and accurate perception of our environment, particularly in everyday tasks like speech perception. Research has highlighted the importance of investigating bottom-up and top-down contributions to multisensory integration and how these change as a function of ageing. Specifically, perceptual factor...

Introduction: Surgeons are among the most at-risk professionals for work-related musculoskeletal decline and experience high mental demands. This study examined the electromyographic (EMG) and electroencephalographic (EEG) activities of surgeons during surgery. Methods: Surgeons who performed live laparoscopic (LS) and robotic (RS) surgeries under...

Lifetime experiences and lifestyle, such as education and engaging in leisure activities, contribute to cognitive reserve (CR), which delays the onset of age-related cognitive decline. Word-finding difficulties have been identified as the most prominent cognitive problem in older age. Whether CR mitigates age-related word-finding difficulties is cu...

The World Health Organization (WHO) aims to improve our understanding of the factors that promote healthy cognitive ageing and combat dementia. Ageing theories that consider individual ageing trajectories are of paramount importance to meet the WHO's aim. Both the revised Scaffolding Theory of Aging and Cognition (STAC-r) and Cognitive Reserve theo...

Speech motor resources may be recruited to assist challenging speech perception in younger normally hearing listeners, but the extent to which this occurs for older adult listeners is unclear. We investigated if speech motor resources are also recruited in older adults during speech perception. Specifically, if suppression of speech motor resources...

This meta-analysis investigated the association between age-related hearing loss and structural neuroanatomy, specifically changes to gray matter volume. Hearing loss is associated with increased risk of cognitive decline. Hence, understanding the effects of hearing loss in older age on brain health is essential. We reviewed studies which compared...

Lifetime experiences and lifestyle, such as education and engaging in leisure activities, contribute to a cognitive reserve (CR) which delays the onset of age-related cognitive decline. Word-finding difficulties have been identified as the most prominent cognitive problem in older age. Whether CR mitigates age-related word-finding difficulties is c...

Ageing leads to word-finding difficulties, reflected by age-related decreases in verbal fluency. Further, verbal fluency impairment might be an early marker for dementia. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between age-related decreases in verbal fluency and functional brain networks, specifically segregation and integration (i.e., com...

During multisensory integration, the time range within which visual and auditory information can be perceived as synchronous and bound together is known as the temporal binding window (TBW). With increasing age, the TBW becomes wider, such that older adults erroneously, and often dangerously, integrate sensory inputs that are asynchronous. Recent r...

Purpose: In March 2020, the UK government announced that people should isolate to reduce the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19. Outside a pandemic, psychosocial factors, such as socialisation and mental health, may impact the relationship between hearing loss and increased dementia risk. We aim to report the impact of psychosocial factors, i...

This meta-analysis investigated the association between age-related hearing loss and structural neuroanatomy, specifically changes to grey matter volume. Hearing loss is associated with increased risk of cognitive decline. Hence, understanding the effects of hearing loss in older age on brain health is essential. We reviewed studies which compared...

The World Health Organization (WHO) aims to improve our understanding of the factors that promote healthy ageing and combat dementia. Both ageing and dementia are accompanied by cognitive changes, however, some people experience more cognitive difficulties than others. Therefore, ageing theories that consider individual ageing trajectories are of p...

Background Surgeons are among the most at risk of work-related musculoskeletal health decline because of the physical demands of surgery, which is also associated with cognitive fatigue. Minimally invasive surgery offers excellent benefits to patients but the impact of robotic or laparoscopic surgery on surgeon well-being is less well understood. T...

Deciding whether others’ emotions are genuine is essential for successful communication and social relationships. While previous fMRI studies suggested that differentiation between authentic and acted emotional expressions involves higher-order brain areas, the time course of authenticity discrimination is still unknown. To address this gap, we tes...

Motor areas for speech production activate during speech perception. Such activation may assist speech perception in challenging listening conditions. It is not known how ageing affects the recruitment of articulatory motor cortex during active speech perception. This study aimed to determine the effect of ageing on recruitment of speech motor cort...

Short-term limb immobilization results in skeletal muscle decline, but the underlying mechanisms are incompletely understood. This study aimed to determine the neurophysiologic basis of immobilization-induced skeletal muscle decline, and whether repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) could prevent any decline. Twenty-four healthy young...

Motor imagery of speech is thought to involve motor planning and simulated execution of speech actions. However, the precise cortical mechanisms subserving motor imagery are poorly understood. For instance, it is unclear to which extent articulatory motor cortex is involved during motor imagery of speech. We investigated the involvement of motor co...

Age-related hearing loss (ARHL) is a common problem for older adults, leading to communication difficulties, isolation, and cognitive decline. Recently, hearing loss has been identified as potentially the most modifiable risk factor for dementia. Listening in challenging situations, or when the auditory system is damaged, strains cortical resources...

Successful perception of speech in everyday listening conditions requires effective listening strategies to overcome common acoustic distortions, such as background noise. Convergent evidence from neuroimaging and clinical studies identify activation within the temporal lobes as key to successful speech perception. However, current neurobiological...

Successful perception of speech in everyday listening conditions requires effective listening strategies to overcome common acoustic distortions, such as background noise. Convergent evidence from neuroimaging and clinical studies identify activation within the temporal lobes as key to successful speech perception. However, current neurobiological...

It is commonly assumed that difficulty in listening to speech in noise is at least partly due to deficits in neural temporal processing. Given that noise reduces the temporal fidelity of the auditory brainstem response (ABR) to speech, it has been suggested that the speech ABR may serve as an index of such neural deficits. However, the temporal fid...

We studied the motor simulation processes involved in concurrent action observation and motor imagery (AO+MI) using motor evoked potentials induced by transcranial magnetic stimulation. During congruent AO+MI, participants were shown videos of a model's hand performing rhythmical finger movements, and they imagined moving the same finger of their o...

Motor imagery refers to the phenomenon of imagining performing an action without action execution. Motor imagery and motor execution are assumed to share a similar underlying neural system that involves primary motor cortex (M1). Previous studies have focused on motor imagery of manual actions, but articulatory motor imagery has not been investigat...

This study aimed to characterize effects of coil orientation on the size of Motor Evoked Potentials (MEPs) from both sides of Orbicularis Oris (OO) and both First Dorsal Interosseous (FDI) muscles, following stimulation to left lip and left hand Primary Motor Cortex. Using a 70 mm figure-of-eight coil, we collected MEPs from eight different orienta...

When we observe someone else speaking, we tend to automatically activate the corresponding speech motor patterns. When listening, we therefore covertly imitate the observed speech. Simulation theories of speech perception propose that covert imitation of speech motor patterns supports speech perception. Covert imitation of speech has been studied w...

Objective This study aimed to characterise effects of coil orientation on the size of Motor Evoked Potentials (MEPs) from both sides of Orbicularis Oris (OO) and compare these effects with those reported for First Dorsal Interosseous (FDI), following stimulation to left lip and left hand Primary Motor Cortex. Methods Using a 70 mm figure-of-eight...

Primary motor (M1) areas for speech production activate during speechperception. It has been suggested that such activation may be dependent upon modulatory inputs from premotor cortex (PMv). If and how PMv differentially modulates M1 activity during perception of speech that is easy or challenging to understand, however, is unclear. This study aim...

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been employed to manipulate brain activity and to establish cortical excitability by eliciting motor evoked potentials (MEPs) in speech processing research. We will discuss the history, methodological underpinnings, key contributions, and future directions for studying speech processing using TMS and by e...

Excitability of articulatory motor cortex is facilitated when listening to speech in challenging conditions. Beyond this, however, we have little knowledge of what listener-specific and speech-specific factors engage articulatory facilitation during speech perception. For example, it is unknown whether speech motor activity is independent or depend...

It has become increasingly evident that human motor circuits are active during speech perception. However, the conditions under which the motor system modulates speech perception are not clear. Two prominent accounts make distinct predictions for how listening to speech engages speech motor representations. The first account suggests that the motor...

The recognition of unfamiliar regional and foreign accents represents a challenging task for the speech perception system (Floccia et al., 2006; Adank et al., 2009). Despite the frequency with which we encounter such accents, the neural mechanisms supporting successful perception of accented speech are poorly understood. Nonetheless, candidate neur...

The speech-evoked auditory brainstem response (speech ABR) is widely considered to provide an index of the quality of neural temporal encoding in the central auditory pathway. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the extent to which the speech ABR is shaped by spectral processing in the cochlea. High-pass noise masking was used to record sp...

Speech perception problems lead to many different forms of communication diffi-culties, and remediation for these prob-lems remains of critical interest. A recent study by Kraus et al. (2014b) published in the Journal of Neuroscience, used a ran-domized controlled trial (RCT) approach to identify how low intensity community-based musical enrichment...

In background noise, the timing precision of the auditory brainstem response to speech (speech-ABR) is disrupted and the response latency increases. The severity of the disruption has been correlated with listeners' ability to understand speech-in-noise. To date, although a central mechanism is assumed, the locus of the speech-ABR timing disruption...