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Study finds age doesn’t affect perception of ‘speech-to-song illusion’
LAWRENCE — A strange thing sometimes happens when we listen to a spoken phrase again and again: It begins to sound like a song. This phenomenon, called the “speech-to-song illusion,” can offer a window into how the mind operates. Now, researchers from the University of Kansas have published a study in PLOS ONE examining if the speech-to-song illusion happens in older adults who are 55 or older as powerfully as it does with younger people.
Virtual institute connects scholars to explore, celebrate work of Zora Neale Hurston
LAWRENCE – This summer, 25 scholars selected for an NEH Summer Institute will convene for an educational research collaboration July 11-30 hosted by The Project on the History of Black Writing at the University of Kansas. They won’t come to Lawrence, as is their custom, but “Hurston on the Horizon” will allow the participants to connect virtually from across the country. As one of 46 institutions funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, this year’s institute drew nearly 100 applicants, the largest in HBW’s history.
Chief of police search committee announces final candidate presentation
LAWRENCE — The third and final candidate for the next University of Kansas chief of police and director of public safety will take part in campus interviews Friday, June 4. Rodney Chatman has been chief of police of the Department of Public Safety for the University of Utah since 2020. Previously, Chatman served as executive director of public safety at the University of Dayton.
Cool Science offers online learning for adults, art contest for kids
LAWRENCE — Cool Science, a National Science Foundation-funded program that integrates science and art to promote understanding of extreme weather events, returns again in 2021 with remote programming for children and adults in Kansas, Missouri and Massachusetts Opportunities include an art competition, workshops for adult mentors, virtual celebrations and winning artwork displays on public buses.
Full stories below.
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Contact: Brendan Lynch, KU News Service, 785-864-8855, [email protected], @BrendanMLynch
Study finds age doesn’t affect perception of ‘speech-to-song illusion’
LAWRENCE — A strange thing sometimes happens when we listen to a spoken phrase again and again: It begins to sound like a song.
This phenomenon, called the “speech-to-song illusion,” can offer a window into how the mind operates and give insight into conditions that affect people’s ability to communicate, like aphasia and aging people’s decreased ability to recall words.
Now, researchers from the University of Kansas have published a study in PLOS ONE examining if the speech-to-song illusion happens in older adults who are 55 or older as powerfully as it does with younger people.
The KU team recruited 199 participants electronically on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (MTurk), a website used to conduct research in the field of psychology. The subjects listened to a sound file that exemplified the speech-to-song illusion, then completed surveys relating to three different studies.
“In the first study, we just played them the canonical stimulus made by the researcher that discovered this illusion — if that can’t create the illusion, then nothing can,” said co-author Michael Vitevitch, professor of psychology at KU. “Then we simply asked people, ‘Did you experience the illusion or not?’ There was no difference in the age of the number of people that said yes or no.”
While the researchers hypothesized fewer older people would perceive the illusion than younger people, the study showed no difference due to age.
While older and younger people perceived the speech-to-song illusion at the same rates, in the second study investigators sought to discover if older people experienced it less powerfully.
“We thought maybe ‘yes or no’ was too coarse of a measurement, so let’s try to use a five-point rating scale,” Vitevitch said. “Maybe older adults would rate it as being a little bit more speech-like and younger adults will rate it as being more song-like and you’ll see it on this five-point scale, maybe. But there was no difference in the numbers with the younger and older adults.”
In the third study, Vitevitch wanted to see if older adults perhaps experience the illusion more slowly than younger people.
“We thought maybe it’s not the strength of the illusion that’s different but maybe it’s when the illusion occurred,” he said. “So, we did a final study and asked people to click a button on the screen when their perception shifted from speech to song — we thought maybe older adults would need a few more repetitions for it to switch over. But we got the same number for both younger adults and older.”
Vitevitch’s co-authors were KU undergraduate researchers Hollie Mullin, Evan Norkey and Anisha Kodwani, as well as Nichol Castro of the University of Buffalo.
According to Vitevitch, the findings might translate to good news for older adults.
“We have this common misconception that everything goes downhill cognitively as we age,” said the KU researcher. “That’s not the case. There are some things that do get worse with age, but there are some things that actually get better with age, and some things that stay consistent with age — in the case of this illusion, you’re going to get equally suckered whether you’re an older adult or a younger adult.”
In another aspect of the research, the investigators found people with musical training experienced the speech-to-song illusion at similar rates as people with no background in music.
“There’s a debate about whether musicians or musically trained people experienced the illusion more or less or sooner or more strongly,” Vitevitch said. “We looked at it and there was really no difference there either. Musicians and non-musically trained people experience this at about the same rates and have the same sort of experience. The amount of musical training didn’t matter. It was just amazingly consistent however we looked at it.”
Not everybody experiences the speech-to-song illusion. The study found about 73% of participants heard spoken words become song-like after several repetitions. But the ability to perceive it didn’t correlate to age or musical training.
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Contact: Heather Anderson, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, 785-864-3667, [email protected], @KUCollege
Virtual institute connects scholars to explore, celebrate work of Zora Neale Hurston
LAWRENCE – This summer, 25 scholars selected for an NEH Summer Institute will convene for an educational research collaboration hosted by The Project on the History of Black Writing at the University of Kansas. They won’t come to Lawrence, as is their custom, but “Hurston on the Horizon” will allow the participants to connect virtually from across the country. As one of 46 institutions funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, this year’s institute drew nearly 100 applicants, the largest in HBW’s history.
The 25 selected scholars will work with top Zora Neale Hurston literary scholars from the U.S. and abroad, engaging with Hurston’s work by participating in synchronous discussions, observing asynchronous presentations, and collaborating on research and teaching projects. Leading Hurston scholars who have confirmed participation include Deborah Plant, Carla Kaplan, John Lowe, Claudine Raynaud and Carmaletta Williams. Additional experts in African American literature and culture include Kevin Quashie, Deborah McDowell and Glenda Carpio as well as KU faculty members Giselle Anatol, Nicole Hodges Persley, Darren Canady and Paul Outka.
The institute is organized by project director Ayesha Hardison, KU professor of English and women, gender & sexuality studies, and by Maryemma Graham, University Distinguished Professor and founder of the Project on the History of Black Writing.
“We are excited to collaborate with the scholars and faculty of the NEH Summer Institute for an intensive study of Hurston, from her most celebrated fiction and ethnographies to her lesser-known work in film and journalism,” Hardison said. “We hope the institute’s return to Hurston, who proves more complex and innovative whenever someone rereads or rediscovers her, will spark new conversations in teaching and research within Hurston studies. I look forward to not only the insights about Hurston we will gain together this summer, but also engaging in what she valued most: community and culture.”
Inspiration for the institute came from Hardison, who had organized the Black Love Symposium in 2017 celebrating the 80th anniversary of Hurston’s famous novel, “Their Eyes Were Watching God.” The book is not only one of the best-known works in the American literature canon but also among the most widely taught in high schools and colleges. The weeklong event in 2017 included the Lawrence community along with a host of scholars, Hollywood directors, graduate and undergraduate students, topped off by a marathon reading of the novel in downtown Lawrence.
In addition to the virtual summer institute, there will be a series of webinars in the fall providing an opportunity to connect with contemporary writers. The group will also be invited to reconvene on-site at the 2022 Zora! Festival in Eatonville, Florida. The festival is a major event for the author’s hometown and sponsored by P.E.C., Preservation for the Eatonville Community, which serves as the institute’s partner organization.
“Hurston on the Horizon: Past, Present and Future” will take place July 11-30. College and university teachers and three graduate students selected for the institute are listed in the online version of this press release.
The Project on the History of Black Writing is a research unit in the Department of English within the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. HBW has put literary recovery work at the center of its research and inclusion work for nearly 40 years. Most recently, HBW’s expansion with a number of digital humanities initiatives involves a partnership with KU Libraries and the HathiTrust Research Center. To date, the National Endowment for the Humanities has supported 15 of HBW’s publicly funded projects.
For more details about the institute itself and events open to the public, visit https://hurston.ku.edu.
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Contact: Jill Hummels, Office of the Provost, 785-864-6577, [email protected], @KUProvost
Chief of police search committee announces final candidate presentation
LAWRENCE — The third and final candidate for the next University of Kansas chief of police and director of public safety will take part in campus interviews Friday, June 4.
The search committee, led by Callie Long, associate vice provost for operations, invites the campus community to watch a virtual public presentation by each candidate and submit questions. The search began after current Chief of Police Chris Keary announced internally his intent to retire this year.
The chief of police and director of public safety is responsible for providing leadership and direction for all operations of the Office of Public Safety. The next police chief will formulate a strategic vision and mission for the department, develop policies and make policy and procedural decisions of the department related to the operation and delivery of police services and the security of the university. The individual will implement procedures for enforcement of agency regulations, state and federal laws and local ordinances. The chief of police is expected to work toward creating a diverse staff that contributes to a campuswide culture of care and helps everyone in the KU community feel they belong.
All candidates have been asked to present their thoughts on “Police Reform on a University Campus.” The remaining candidate presentation schedule:
1. June 4, 1:45-2:45 p.m.: Register here.
Registration is required for all presentation viewers, and participation is limited to the first 300 registrants. Questions from viewers will be moderated and presented by search committee members.
The final candidate, Rodney Chatman, has been chief of police of the Department of Public Safety for the University of Utah since 2020. Previously, Chatman served as executive director of public safety at the University of Dayton. From 2005 to 2016, he was an officer at the University of Cincinnati, where he rose to the level of captain and oversaw the department’s professional standards. He earned both a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in criminal justice from the University of Cincinnati. His resume is available for review on the search webpage.
The first two candidates – Terence Calloway, chief of police at Florida A&M University, and Nelson Mosley, chief of police for Rose Hill – were announced earlier this week.
Search committee chair Long and other members of the committee invite the campus community to provide feedback on the candidates by June 13. A link for the feedback form is available on the search webpage.
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https://kansaspublicradio.org/when-experts-attack
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Contact: Claudia Bode, Center for Environmentally Beneficial Catalysis, 785-864-1627, [email protected]
Cool Science offers online learning for adults, art contest for kids
LAWRENCE — Cool Science, a National Science Foundation-funded program that integrates science and art to promote understanding of extreme weather events, returns again in 2021 with remote programming for children and adults in Kansas, Missouri and Massachusetts.
Opportunities include an art competition, workshops for adult mentors, virtual celebrations and winning artwork displays on public buses.
“I think it is fantastic how the Cool Science program engages not just children, but also adults who work with children, giving these adults the tools they need to integrate art and science in classrooms and informal settings,” said Claudia Bode, education director for the Center for Environmentally Beneficial Catalysis at KU.
Bode leads the Cool Science program with principal investigator Steven Schrock, professor of transportation engineering. They collaborate on this effort with Jill Hendrickson Lohmeier, associate professor of education at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell; Robert Chen, professor of oceanography and interim dean of the University of Massachusetts Boston’s School for the Environment; Lois Hetland, professor of art education at Massachusetts College of Art and Design, and Stephen Mishol, associate professor of art at U-Mass-Lowell.
Mentor workshops
3-4:30 p.m. June 7, 9, 11, 22, 23, 24
Adults who work with K-12 youths in Kansas, Missouri and Massachusetts can apply to participate in free online workshops to learn how to integrate art and weather science.
Workshop participants receive art supplies and other resources to support youths engaged in the art competition. Participants who complete these training activities — and mentor children who participate in the competition — can also earn up to $200.
The workshops are open to any adults — scout leaders, teachers, informal educators and parents — who work with at least 10 youths. Space is limited. Learn more online.
Cool Science Art Competition
Submission deadline Dec. 10
This annual art competition is for K-12 youths. Children choose one of three challenge questions to serve as the basis of their artwork. For example, they might artistically represent how severe storms form or how to keep cool in sweltering heatwaves. Winners receive cash prizes and the opportunity to have their work featured on their state’s public transportation. Learn more online.
Art Exhibition Celebrations
Cool Science will livestream their art exhibition celebrations to acknowledge the honorees from the 2020 Cool Science art competition. Youths from 60 different schools and 62 different hometowns in Kansas, Missouri and Massachusetts submitted a total of 274 total pieces of artwork. Each event will feature art and science guest speakers. Kansas and Missouri events are listed below.
Kansas City Virtual Celebration
7-8 p.m. June 9
Guest speakers: Kenton Gewecke with KOMU-TV, University of Missouri, and Jill Pelto, climate change artist and scientist.
Topeka Virtual Celebration
7-8 p.m. June 16
Guest speakers: David Rahn, associate professor of geography & atmospheric science at KU, and Jill Pelto, climate change artist and scientist
Learn more at www.coolscience.net/art-exhibition-celebrations.
Online Resources
Cool Science offers a variety of learning opportunities on its website. Training videos and lesson materials are coming soon as well for anyone to access.
NSF funds Cool as part of the “Advancing Informal STEM Learning” (AISL) initiative.
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