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Cerebral Cortex Advance Access originally published online on August 17, 2006
Cerebral Cortex 2007 17(6):1454-1467; doi:10.1093/cercor/bhl056
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© The Author 2006. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Age-Related Changes in Transient and Oscillatory Brain Responses to Auditory Stimulation in Healthy Adults 19–45 Years Old

Catherine Poulsen1, Terence W. Picton2 and Tomas Paus1,3

1 Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Canada, 2 The Rotman Research Institute, Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care, Toronto, Canada, 3 Brain & Body Centre, University of Nottingham, UK

Address correspondence to Catherine Poulsen, PhD, Montreal Neurological Institute, 3801 University Street, Montreal, Quebec H3A 2B4, Canada. Email: cpoulsen{at}bic.mni.mcgill.ca.

The capacity of the human cerebral cortex to track fast temporal changes in auditory stimuli is related to the development of language in children and to deficits in speech perception in the elderly. Although maturation of temporal processing in children and its deterioration in the elderly has been investigated previously, little is known about naturally occurring changes in auditory temporal processing between these limits. The present study examined age-related (19–45 years) changes in 3 electrophysiological measures of auditory processing: 1) the late transient auditory evoked potentials to tone onset, 2) the auditory steady-state response (ASSR) to a 40-Hz frequency–modulated tone, and 3) the envelope following response (EFR) to sweeps of amplitude-modulated white noise from 10 to 100 Hz. With increasing age, the latency of the auditory P1–N1 complex decreased, the oscillatory (ASSR) response became larger and more stable, and the resonant peak of the EFR increased from 38 Hz at 19 years to 46 Hz at 45 years. Source analysis localized these changes to the auditory regions of the temporal lobe. These results indicate persistent adaptation of cortical auditory processes into middle adulthood. We speculate that experience-driven myelination and/or refinement of inhibitory circuits may underlie these changes.

Key Words: auditory evoked potentials • electroencephalography • language • maturation • plasticity • steady-state response


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