[AUDITORY] Corrected: sex differences in auditory processing ("Patel, Aniruddh D." )

Subject: [AUDITORY] Corrected: sex differences in auditory processing From: "Patel, Aniruddh D." <a.patel@xxxxxxxx> Date: Fri, 1 Apr 2022 03:14:26 +0000 --_000_SN6PR05MB52313B678871AB402EF37329E3E09SN6PR05MB5231namp_ Content-Type: text/plain; charset="Windows-1252" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Dear List, Apologies for sending this again, but apparently the updated message I sent= yesterday was missing Baskent's and Partanen's responses. So here it is = again, with their responses at the bottom. Ani Patel ------------ Dear List, In collating response to my query on sex differences in auditory processing= I inadvertently omitted a Jan 12, 2022 response by Deniz Baskent, who offe= red cautionary advice about research on this topic. That response is now i= ncluded at the bottom of the replies below. Above the Baskent response is = one more reply that came in after I sent out the summary, from Eino Partane= n. Sex differences in auditory processing =96 updated collection of responses = (March 31, 2022) Original query sent Jan 9, 2022: Dear List, I am trying to find papers reporting sex differences in behavioral or neura= l measures of auditory processing in vertebrates. I'd be grateful for point= ers to any references, including review chapters. Btw, my impression from the papers I've found so far is that females genera= lly outperform males (e.g., refs below), and I wonder if this holds across = a larger set of studies. Benichov, J. I., Benezra, S. E., Vallentin, D., Globerson, E., Long, M. A.,= & Tchernichovski, O. (2016). The forebrain song system mediates predictive= call timing in female and male zebra finches. Current Biology, 26(3), 309-= 318. Kriengwatana, B., Spierings, M. J., & ten Cate, C. (2016). Auditory discrim= ination learning in zebra finches: effects of sex, early life conditions an= d stimulus characteristics. Animal Behaviour, 116, 99-112. Krizman, J., Bonacina, S., & Kraus, N. (2020). Sex differences in subcortic= al auditory processing only partially explain higher prevalence of language= disorders in males. Hearing research, 398, 108075. Thanks, and best wishes for the new year, Ani Patel ----------------- Responses: From Erick Gallun: I found Karen Helfer's paper on estrogen-related differences in competing s= peech understanding to be a very interesting study. It would be nice to see= someone follow up on this. Helfer, K. S. (2004). Cross-sectional study of differences in speech unders= tanding between users and nonusers of estrogen replacement therapy. Experim= ental Aging Research, 30(2), 195-204. ------------------ From Tim Ziemer: Arne von Ruschkowski gives an overview of gender differences in loudness pe= rception (in German though): https://ediss.sub.uni-hamburg.de/handle/ediss/= 5262 and argues that the length of the ear canal and the air volume between eard= rum and headphone could not be the reasons for the different judgments of m= ale and female participants. One observation that has been made is that already female newborns exhibit = stronger otoacoustic emissions than male newborns: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3085661/ Otoacoustic emissions and auditory evoked potentials are sexually dimporphi= c: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4163528/ Sex differences in male and female mosquito hearing are huge, and their hea= ring organs differ a lot. -- From Anna Wolf: We found sex differences in both ear training and musical imagery skills in= music students/musicians, see: Wolf, A., & Kopiez, R. (2018). Development and Validation of the Musical Ea= r Training Assessment (META). Journal of Research in Music Education, 66, 5= 3-70. Wolf, A., Kopiez, R., & Platz, F. (2018). Thinking in music: An objective m= easure of notation-evoked sound imagery in musicians. Psychomusicology: Mus= ic, Mind, and Brain, 28(4), 209-221. For both skills men outperformed women, which replicated in every sample we= collected for these papers. My best guess is a difference in motivation in= female and male students with music theory and ear training being the most= logical and structural type of skill within a music programme (the MINT wi= thin music, maybe). Plus probably stereotype threat, since in Germany most = music theory staff are male. ---------- From Arturo Moleti There are well-known sex differences in otoacoustic emission levels, e.g. M= cFadden papers, with females outperforming males. You can easily find sever= al references searching for "sex difference OAE", e.g., on Pubmed. ------------ From Leslie Bernstein Google: sex differences McFadden ----------------- From Martin Braun McFadden & Co not only established that females outperform males in SOAE incidence and levels (by a strikingly huge difference) but also by hearing threshold in quiet. Interestingly, to my knowledge neither McFadden nor anybody else could as yet present a convincing theory for the reasons of these differences. There have been data that outer hair cell (OHC) physiology is affected by sex hormones, but apparently SOAE researchers and OHC researchers have been living too much apart and neither of them has followed this up. PS: I assume that females are also better in central auditory processing of speech, but I am not aware of any data in that realm. -------------- From Sam Mehr We cited a few papers on this topic in our BBS target article https://pubme= d.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32843107. The general pattern, for higher-level auditory= tasks, seemed to be minimal-to-zero effects of gender. Informally, in the many hundreds of thousands of participants who do music = perception tasks on our platform internationally, we have found comparably = underwhelming sex differences, e.g. on pitch perception, beat alignment, mi= stuning, etc, but not much of these data are published (yet!) --------------- From Matthew Joseph Goupell We did a posthoc analysis of a dataset that may be relevant. Xie, Z., Shader, M. J., Gordon-Salant, S., Anderson, S. and Goupell, M. J. = (2020) =93Letter to the Editor: Possible sex effects on the processing of t= emporal cues in word segments in adult cochlear-implant users,=94 Trends He= ar. 24, 1-2. -------------------- From Alex Francis I think it=92s more complicated than just =93females vs. males=94 - you=92r= e going to have to deal with differences In the role that acoustic signals = play for different organisms in different contexts/ecologies. And seasons. = My colleague Jeff Lucas has done some work on hormonal and seasonal variati= on in hearing in birds across different species that occupy different niche= s: https://lucaslabpurdue.weebly.com/ --------------------- From Massimo Grassi A few years ago I found this: Grassi, M. (2010). Sex difference in subjective duration of looming and receding sounds. Perception, 39(10), 1424-1426. Looming sounds (ie sounds that increase in level over time) are perceived as longer than receding sounds (a looming sound reversed in time). But this perceptually asymmetry seemed larger in females than males. However, I now think that result was likely a false positive (or just strictly related to the method of that particular experiment at best) because in successive (and previous) experiments the sex difference never emerged again. In general, I would be cautious about the results reported in literature. Studies that observe sex differences are often small in number of participants and results tend to be weak. ------------------------ From Manon Grube: See this paper: Sutherland, M. E., Zatorre, R. J., Watkins, K. E., Herv=E9,= P. Y., Leonard, G., Pike, B. G., ... & Paus, T. (2012). Anatomical correla= tes of dynamic auditory processing: relationship to literacy during early a= dolescence. Neuroimage, 60(2), 1287-1295. -------------------------- From Sarah Yoho: See this paper: Yoho, S. E., Borrie, S. A., Barrett, T. S., & Whittaker, D.= B. (2019). Are there sex effects for speech intelligibility in American En= glish? Examining the influence of talker, listener, and methodology. Attent= ion, Perception, & Psychophysics, 81(2), 558-570. ------------------------ From Jen Krizman: In addition to our work in humans, which you listed, we also have a recentl= y published paper, in collaboration with Kasia Bieszczad and Elena Rotondo = from Rutgers, that replicates and extends our human sex differences in rode= nts. Krizman J, Rotondo EK, Nicol T, Kraus N, Bieszczad K (2021) Sex differences= in auditory processing vary across estrous cycle. Scientific Reports. 11: = 22898 --------------------- From Ulf Kalla When it comes to sex differences I have one article to refer You to. That s= tudy is based on quite big number of newborn participants=92 ears, with ove= r 12.000 per side for males and over 12.000 per side for females, hence the= significant differences for sex should be quite robust. Berninger, Erik (2007), Characteristics of normal newborn transient-evoked = otoacoustic emissions: Ear asymmetries and sex effects, International Journ= al of Audiology, 46:11, 661 =97 669 As stated in the thread the question why is always interesting. One explan= ation I got is connected to hormones, where the increased level of testoste= rone is maybe responsible for this sex difference. Maybe also that is an ex= planation to why males tend to get earlier and harder onset when it comes t= o age related hearing loss? The last part is my own guess and not yet ancho= red in any evidence. ---------------------- From Eino Partanen: Here are a few studies in infants: A study of infants by Angela Friederici and others: Friederici, A. D., Pann= ekamp, A., Partsch, C. J., Ulmen, U., Oehler, K., Schmutzler, R., & Hesse, = V. (2008). Sex hormone testosterone affects language organization in the in= fant brain. Neuroreport, 19(3), 283-286. and a similar study in childhood: Schaadt, G., Hesse, V., & Friederici, A. = D. (2015). Sex hormones in early infancy seem to predict aspects of later l= anguage development. Brain and language, 141, 70-76. (I find both studies unreliable due to small sample sizes, as generally we = see sex differences in small samples but not in large samples, e.g. Wallent= in 2009 & 2020.) There is also a study by Jutta Mueller and others, showing sex differences = in auditory processing: Mueller, J. L., Friederici, A. D., & M=E4nnel, C. (= 2012). Auditory perception at the root of language learning. Proceedings of= the National Academy of Sciences, 109(39), 15953-15958. In addition, an intervention study showed sex differences, larger responses= in females: Kostilainen, K., Partanen, E., Mikkola, K., Wikstr=F6m, V., Pa= karinen, S., Fellman, V., & Huotilainen, M. (2021). Repeated Parental Singi= ng During Kangaroo Care Improved Neural Processing of Speech Sound Changes = in Preterm Infants at Term Age. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 15. However, a similar study from the same cohort found the opposite effect, wi= th larger responses in males, but the paper is still waiting to be publishe= d on the Frontiers website: Partanen, M=E5rtensson, Hugoson, Huotilainen, F= ellman & =C5d=E9n (in press). Auditory processing of the brain is enhanced = by parental singing for preterm infants. Frontiers in Neuroscience. --------------- From Deniz Baskent: If you look for McFadden papers, please also see a commentary we wrote abou= t one of his related papers. The point of this commentary is that maybe sex= /gender differences (or race differences also) are not as "well known" as w= e assume, and there could be a number of confounds in such studies: https://psyarxiv.com/ghfpv/ When choosing references for such differences, I think it pays to be a bit = critical to not potentially spread possibly not very clear or accurate find= ings. Ani, your question is a legitimate one, ie, if some effects reported in one= small-sample size study would also hold with larger populations, or across= a number of studies. What I observe is that often we add an analysis of se= x/gender/race factor without a strong background hypothesis for why we shou= ld do so, and it feels often this analysis is done just because it has alwa= ys been done. And then when we find an effect within a small population and= for a study that was not necessarily designed for investigating sex differ= ences, we conclude a bit fast that there is such difference. In many listen= ing/speech tests, linguistic skills, musical background or aptitude, own or= parents' education level (especially for children), or other demographic f= actors may actually play a larger role, but somehow instead of such potenti= ally more relevant factors, gender/sex difference analysis is conducted. I = am worried this leads to misleading conclusions. Where a sex difference is reported, it is sometimes done based on great man= y assumptions. One big assumption is that what one reports as gender is eq= uivalent to one's sex too. For example, if there is a female-sex related ho= rmone that may have an effect on a hearing-related mechanism, then one's re= ported gender may or may not indicate the presence of such hormone. How cou= ld we know that? Same goes with race effects. One may identify themselves a= s African-American without having dark skin, while the hearing-effects rela= ted to skin color have been shown for melatonin levels. Hence, without meas= uring melatonin or skin color per se, and just asking participants their se= lf-identified race, again, may lead to wrong conclusions. Where there seems consistent differences between males and females in liter= ature seems in the hearing thresholds in older age groups, and often these = are large-sample studies and seem to hold across different populations acro= ss studies. (By the way, it looks like this difference seems to become smal= ler with younger generations.) An idea related to this is female hormones p= otentially having protective effects for hearing, as mentioned above, but a= nother idea is environmental factors, such as males being more exposed to l= ouder environments, especially in older generations, such as working in fac= tories with no or minimal hearing protection. In short, these differences may or may not be there, but I would not say t= hese are well-known. It is not a given. Instead, I would suggest that we al= l be careful about what a study really measured and was the finding valid; = was it really designed to identify such differences,did it use correct para= digms, did it choose appropriate populations, are conclusions interpreted c= orrectly? Also in own studies, are we looking into such differences for goo= d reasons, based on prior work and evidence for it, or just because it has = always been done this way and it is easy to throw this factor into the anal= ysis? This would be my long answer to a seemingly short question. :) Hope it help= s. ------------ End of replies. --_000_SN6PR05MB52313B678871AB402EF37329E3E09SN6PR05MB5231namp_ Content-Type: text/html; charset="Windows-1252" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable <html> <head> <meta http-equiv=3D"Content-Type" content=3D"text/html; charset=3DWindows-1= 252"> <style type=3D"text/css" style=3D"display:none;"> P {margin-top:0;margin-bo= ttom:0;} </style> </head> <body dir=3D"ltr"> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> Dear List,</div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> Apologies for sending this again, but apparently the updated message I sent= yesterday was missing Baskent's and Partanen's responses.   So h= ere it is again, with their responses at the bottom.</div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> Ani Patel</div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> ------------</div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> Dear List,</div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> In collating response to my query on sex differences= in auditory processing I inadvertently omitted a Jan 12, 2022 response by Deniz Baskent, who offered cautionary advice ab= out research on this topic.  That response is now included at the bott= om of the replies below.  Above the Baskent response is one more reply= that came in after I sent out the summary, from <font color=3D"black" size=3D"+1" style=3D"font-fa= mily:"Segoe UI", "Segoe UI Web (West European)", "= Segoe UI", -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Roboto, "Helvetica = Neue", sans-serif;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255)">Eino Partanen. </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </div> <div style=3D"font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size= : 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> Sex differences in auditory processing =96 updated collection of respons= es (March 31, 2022)<o:p> </o:p> Original query sent Jan 9, 2022:<o:p> </o:p> Dear List, I am trying to find papers reporting sex differences in behavioral or neura= l measures of auditory processing in vertebrates. I'd be grateful= for pointers to any references, including review chapters. Btw, my impression from the papers I've found so far is that females genera= lly outperform males (e.g., refs below), and I wonder if this holds across = a larger set of studies. Benichov, J. I., Benezra, S. E., Vallentin, D., Globerson, E., Long, M. A.,= & Tchernichovski, O. (2016). The forebrain song system mediates predic= tive call timing in female and male zebra finches. Current Biology,&nb= sp;26(3), 309-318. Kriengwatana, B., Spierings, M. J., & ten Cate, C. (2016). Auditor= y discrimination learning in zebra finches: effects of sex, early life= conditions and stimulus characteristics. Animal Behaviour, 116, = 99-112. Krizman, J., Bonacina, S., & Kraus, N. (2020). Sex differences in subcortical auditory proc= essing only partially explain higher prevalence of language disorders in ma= les. Hearing research, 398, 108075. Thanks, and best wishes for the new year, Ani Patel <o:p> </o:p> -----------------<o:p> </o:p> Responses:<o:p> </o:p> From Erick Gallun:<o:p> </o:p> I found Karen Helfer's paper on estrogen-related differences in competing s= peech understanding to be a very interesting study. It would be nice to see= someone follow up on this.<o:p> </o:p> Helfer, K. S. (2004). Cross-sectional study of differences in speech unders= tanding between users and nonusers of estrogen replacement therapy. Ex= perimental Aging Research, 30(2), 195-204.<o:p> </o:p> ------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Tim Ziemer:<o:p> </o:p> Arne von Ruschkowski gives an overview of gender differences in loudness pe= rception (in German though): <a href=3D"https://ediss.sub.uni-hamburg.de/handle/ediss/5262" target=3D"_b= lank">https://ediss.sub.uni-hamburg.de/handle/ediss/5262</a><o:p> </o:= p> <o:p> </o:p> and argues that the length of the ear canal and the air volume between eard= rum and headphone could not be the reasons for the different judgments of m= ale and female participants.<o:p> </o:p> One observation that has been made is that already female newborns exhibit = stronger otoacoustic emissions than male newborns:<o:p> </o:p> <a href=3D"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3085661/" target=3D= "_blank">https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3085661/</a><o:p>&nbs= p;</o:p> Otoacoustic emissions and auditory evoked potentials are sexually= dimporphic:<o:p> </o:p> <a href=3D"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4163528/" target=3D= "_blank">https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4163528/</a><o:p>&nbs= p;</o:p> Sex differences in male and female mosquito hearing are huge, and their hea= ring organs differ a lot.<o:p> </o:p> --<o:p> </o:p> From Anna Wolf:<o:p> </o:p> We found sex differences in both ear training and musical imagery skills in= music students/musicians, see:<o:p> </o:p> Wolf, A., & Kopiez, R. (2018). Development and Validation of the Musica= l Ear Training Assessment (META). Journal of Research in Music Ed= ucation, 66, 53-70.<o:p> </o:p> Wolf, A., Kopiez, R., & Platz, F. (2018). Thinking in music: An objecti= ve measure of notation-evoked sound imagery in musicians. Psychom= usicology: Music, Mind, and Brain, 28(4), 209-221.<o:p> </o:p></p= > For both skills men outperformed women, which replicated in every sample we= collected for these papers. My best guess is a difference in motivation in= female and male students with music theory and ear training being the most= logical and structural type of skill within a music programme (the MINT within music, maybe). Plus probab= ly stereotype threat, since in Germany most music theory staff are male.&nb= sp;<o:p> </o:p> ----------<o:p> </o:p> From Arturo Moleti<o:p> </o:p> There are well-known sex differences in otoacoustic emission levels, e.g. M= cFadden papers, with females outperforming males. You can easily find sever= al references searching for "sex difference OAE", e.g., on Pubmed= . ------------<o:p> </o:p> From Leslie Bernstein<o:p> </o:p> Google: sex differences McFadden<o:p> </o:p> -----------------<o:p> </o:p> From Martin Braun<o:p> </o:p> McFadden & Co not only established that females outperform males in SOA= E incidence and levels (by a strikingly huge difference) but also by hearing<= br> threshold in quiet. Interestingly, to my knowledge neither McFadden nor anybody else could as yet present a convincing theory for the reasons of<br= > these differences. There have been data that outer hair cell (OHC) physiology is affected by sex hormones, but apparently SOAE researchers and= OHC researchers have been living too much apart and neither of them has followed this up. PS: I assume that females are also better in central auditory pro= cessing of speech, but I am not aware of any data in that realm.<o:p> </o:p> --------------<o:p> </o:p> From Sam Mehr<o:p> </o:p> We cited a few papers on this topic in our BBS target article <a href= =3D"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32843107" target=3D"_blank">https://pub= med.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32843107</a>. The general pattern, for higher-level&nb= sp;auditory tasks, seemed to be minimal-to-zero effects of gender.<o:p> </o:p> Informally, in the many hundreds of thousands of participants who do music = perception tasks on our platform internationally, we have found comparably = underwhelming sex differences, e.g. on pitch perception, beat alignment, mi= stuning, etc, but not much of these data are published (yet!)<o:p> </o:p> ---------------<o:p> </o:p> From Matthew Joseph Goupell<o:p> </o:p> We did a posthoc analysis of a dataset that may be relevant.<o:p>&nbsp= ;</o:p> Xie, Z., Shader, M. J., Gordon-Salant, S., Anderson, S. and Goupell, M. J.&= nbsp;(2020) =93Letter to the Editor: Possible sex effects on the processing= of temporal cues in word segments in adult cochlear-implant users,=94&nbsp= ;Trends Hear. 24, 1-2.<o:p> </o:p> --------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Alex Francis<o:p> </o:p> I think it=92s more complicated than just =93females vs. males=94 - you=92r= e going to have to deal with differences In the role that acoustic signals = play for different organisms in different contexts/ecologies. And seasons. = My colleague Jeff Lucas has done some work on hormonal and seasonal variation in hearing in birds across different sp= ecies that occupy different niches:<o:p> </o:p> <a href=3D"https://lucaslabpurdue.weebly.com/" target=3D"_blank">https://lu= caslabpurdue.weebly.com/</a><o:p> </o:p> ---------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Massimo Grassi<o:p> </o:p> A few years ago I found this: Grassi, M. (2010). Sex difference in subjective duration of looming and receding sounds. Perception, 39(10), 1424-1426. Looming sounds (ie sounds that increase in level over time) are perceived as longer than receding sounds (a looming sound reversed in time). But this perceptually asymmetry seemed larger in females than males. However, I now think that result was likely a false positive (or just strictly related to the method of that particular experiment at best) because in successive (and previous) experiments the sex difference never emerged again. In general, I would be cautious about the results reported in literature. Studies that observe sex differences are often small in number of participants and results tend to be weak. ------------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Manon Grube:<o:p> </o:p> See this paper: Sutherland, M. E., Zatorre, R. J., Watkins, K. E., Herv=E9,= P. Y., Leonard, G., Pike, B. G., ... & Paus, T. (2012). Anatomical cor= relates of dynamic auditory processing: relationship to literacy during ear= ly adolescence. Neuroimage, 60(2), 1287-1295.<o:p> </o:p></p= > --------------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Sarah Yoho:<o:p> </o:p> See this paper: Yoho, S. E., Borrie, S. A., Barrett, T. S., & Whittaker= , D. B. (2019). Are there sex effects for speech intelligibility in America= n English? Examining the influence of talker, listener, and methodology.&nb= sp;Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 81(2), 558-570.<o:p> </o:p> ------------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Jen Krizman:<o:p> </o:p> In addition to our work in humans, which you listed, we also have a re= cently published paper, in collaboration with Kasia Bieszczad and Elen= a Rotondo from Rutgers, that replicates and extends our human sex diff= erences in rodents. <o:p> </o:p> Krizman J, Rotondo EK, Nicol T, Kraus N, Bieszczad K (2021) Sex differ= ences in auditory processing vary across estrous cycle. Scientific Rep= orts. 11: 22898<o:p> </o:p> ---------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Ulf Kalla<o:p> </o:p> When it comes to sex differences I have one article to refer You = to. That study is based on quite big number of newborn participants=92 ears= , with over 12.000 per side for males and over 12.000 per side for females,= hence the significant differences for sex should be quite robust.<o:p> </o:p> Berninger, Erik (2007), Characteristics of normal newborn transient-ev= oked otoacoustic emissions: Ear asymmetries and sex effects, International = Journal of Audiology, 46:11, 661 =97 669<o:p> </o:p>  As stated in the thread the question why is always interesting. One e= xplanation I got is connected to hormones, where the increased level of tes= tosterone is maybe responsible for this sex difference. Maybe also that is = an explanation to why males tend to get earlier and harder onset when it comes to age related hearing loss? The la= st part is my own guess and not yet anchored in any evidence.<o:p> </o= :p> ----------------------<o:p> </o:p> From Eino Partanen:<o:p> </o:p> Here are a few studies in infants:<o:p> </o:p> A study of infants by Angela Friederici and others: Friederici, A. D., Pann= ekamp, A., Partsch, C. J., Ulmen, U., Oehler, K., Schmutzler, R., & Hes= se, V. (2008). Sex hormone testosterone affects language organization in th= e infant brain. Neuroreport, 19(3), 283-286.<o:p> </o:p> and a similar study in childhood: Schaadt, G., Hesse, V., & Friederici,= A. D. (2015). Sex hormones in early infancy seem to predict aspects of lat= er language development. Brain and language, 141, 70-76.<o:p> </o:p></= p> (I find both studies unreliable due to small sample sizes, as generally we = see sex differences in small samples but not in large samples, e.g. Wallent= in 2009 & 2020.)<o:p> </o:p> There is also a study by Jutta Mueller and others, showing sex differences = in auditory processing: Mueller, J. L., Friederici, A. D., & = M=E4nnel, C. (2012). Auditory perception at the root of language = learning. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 109(39), 15953-15958.<o:p> </o:p> In addition, an intervention study showed sex differences, larger responses= in females: Kostilainen, K., Partanen, E., Mikkola, K., Wikstr=F6m, V., Pa= karinen, S., Fellman, V., & Huotilainen, M. (2021). Repeated Parental S= inging During Kangaroo Care Improved Neural Processing of Speech Sound Changes in Preterm Infants at Term Age. Frontie= rs in Neuroscience, 15.<o:p> </o:p> However, a similar study from the same cohort found the opposite effect, wi= th larger responses in males, but the paper is still waiting to be publishe= d on the Frontiers website: Partanen, M=E5rtensson, Hugoson, Huotilainen, F= ellman & =C5d=E9n (in press). Auditory processing of the brain is enhanced by parental singing for preterm infants. Frontier= s in Neuroscience.<o:p> </o:p> -----= ----------<o:p> </o:p> <o:p>=  </o:p> From Deniz Baskent:<o:p> </o:p> If you look for McFadden papers, please also see a commentary we wrote abou= t one of his related papers. The point of this commentary is that mayb= e sex/gender differences (or race differences also) are not as &q= uot;well known" as we assume, and there could be a number of confounds in such studies:<o:p> </o:p> <a href=3D"https://psyarxiv.com/ghfpv/" target=3D"_blank">https://psyarxiv.= com/ghfpv/</a><o:p> </o:p> When choosing references for such differences, I think it pays to be a bit = critical to not potentially spread possibly not very clear or accurate find= ings.<o:p> </o:p> Ani, your question is a legitimate one, ie, if some effects reported in&nbs= p;one small-sample size study would also hold with larger po= pulations, or across a number of studies. What I observe is that&= nbsp;often we add an analysis of sex/gender/race factor=  without a strong background hypothesis for why we should do so, and it feels ofte= n this analysis is done just because it has always&nbsp= ;been done. And then when we find an effect within a small population and f= or a study that was not necessarily designed for investigating sex differences, we conclude a bit fast that there is such differenc= e. In many listening/speech tests, linguistic skills, musical bac= kground or aptitude, own or parents' education level (especi= ally for children), or other demographic factors may actually pla= y a larger role, but somehow instead of such potentially more relevant = factors, gender/sex difference analysis is conducted. I am worried thi= s leads to misleading conclusions.<o:p> </o:p> Where a sex difference is reported, it is sometimes done based on&nbsp= ;great many assumptions.  One big assumption is that what one reports = as gender is equivalent to one's sex too. For example, if there is a female= -sex related hormone that may have an effect on a hearing-related mechanism, then one's reported gender may or may not ind= icate the presence of such hormone. How could we know that? Same goes with = race effects. One may identify themselves as African-American without havin= g dark skin, while the hearing-effects related to skin color have been shown for melatonin levels. Hence, wi= thout measuring melatonin or skin color per se, and just asking participant= s their self-identified race, again, may lead to wrong conclusion= s.<o:p> </o:p> Where there seems consistent differences between males and female= s in literature seems in the hearing thresholds in older age=  groups, and often these are large-sample studies and seem to hol= d across different populations across studies. (By the way, it looks like this difference seems to become smaller with younger generations.)&nb= sp;An idea related to this is female hormones potentially having protective= effects for hearing, as mentioned above, but another idea is environm= ental factors, such as males being more exposed to louder environments, especially in older generations, such as working i= n factories with no or minimal hearing protection.<o:p> </o:p>  In short, these differences may or may not be there, but I = would not say these are well-known. It is not a given. = Instead, I would suggest that we all be careful about what a study rea= lly measured and was the finding valid; was it really designed to= identify such differences,did it use correct paradigms, did it choose appropri= ate populations, are conclusions interpreted correctly?&nbsp= ;Also in own studies, are we looking into such differences for good reasons= , based on prior work and evidence for it, or just because it has always been done this way and it is easy to throw this factor into = the analysis? <o:p> </o:p> This would be my long answer to a seemingly short question. :) Hope it help= s.<o:p> </o:p> ------------<o:p> </o:p> End of replies.<o:p> </o:p> </div> </body> </html> --_000_SN6PR05MB52313B678871AB402EF37329E3E09SN6PR05MB5231namp_--

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Electrical Engineering Dept., Columbia University