Colburn Lecture: Dr. Barbara Shinn-Cunningham

Title: "Hijacking and helping auditory attention: How interruptions and prediction shape everyday communication"

Abstract: Communicating in social settings relies on the ability to focus on a relevant sound amid competing sources—for example, following a dinner conversation at a crowded restaurant. In healthy listeners, volitional, top-down goals and involuntary, bottom-up interruptions interact to prioritize behaviorally important sounds while maintaining situational awareness. In noisy environments, predictive processes can support this effort by helping listeners parse complex auditory scenes. This talk reviews behavioral and neurophysiological research on the brain networks engaged during auditory attention, with a focus on how bottom-up interruptions disrupt top-down focus and how expectation and learning help stabilize it. Together, these findings highlight how top-down and bottom-up attention, memory, and experience interact to support robust communication in everyday environments.