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Speech Motor Learning and Retention (Aim 2)

Sensorimotor Basis of Speech Motor Learning and Retention

Who can join

Ages 18 to 40 · All sexes · Healthy volunteers welcome

Inclusion Criteria:

* Fluent English speakers
* Right-handed
* Normal hearing
* No speech disorder or reading disability

Exclusion Criteria:

* Cardiac pacemaker
* Aneurysm clip
* Heart or Vascular clip
* Prosthetic valve
* Metal implants
* Metal in brain, skull, or spinal cord
* Implanted neurostimulator
* Medication infusion device
* Cochlear implant or tinnitus (ringing in ears)
* Personal and/or family history of epilepsy or other neurological disorders or history of head concussion
* Psychoactive medications
* Pregnancy

About the study

The overall goal of this research is to test a new model of speech motor learning, whose central hypothesis is that learning and retention are associated with plasticity not only in motor areas of the brain but in auditory and somatosensory regions as well. The strategy for the proposed research is to identify individual brain areas that contribute causally to retention by disrupting their activity with transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). Investigators will also use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) which will enable identification of circuit-level activity which predicts either learning or retention of new movements, and hence test the specific contributions of candidate sensory and motor zones. In other studies, investigators will record sensory and motor evoked potentials over the course of learning to determine the temporal order in which individual sensory and cortical motor regions contribute. The goal here is to identify brain areas in which learning-related plasticity occurs first and which among these areas predict subsequent learning.

What is being tested

• Adaptation (behavioral)
• Adaptation baseline (behavioral)
• Motor evoked potentials (device)
• Auditory evoked potentials (device)
• Somatosensory evoked potentials (device)

Sponsor: Yale University · Participants: 120 · Started: Oct 1, 2024

Contact the study team

• David Ostry · Phone: 2038656163

Official record on ClinicalTrials.gov — NCT06491823

Locations in the U.S.

From ClinicalTrials.gov, data retrieved Sep 29, 2026. Each study sets its own eligibility; the study team decides who can join.