Increased speech contrast induced by sensorimotor adaptation to a nonuniform auditory perturbation

To date, the speech motor learning evoked in sensorimotor adaptation studies has had little ecological consequences for communication. By inducing complex, nonuniform acoustic errors, we show that adaptation can be leveraged to cause an increase in speech sound contrast, a change that has the capacity to improve intelligibility. This study is relevant for models of sensorimotor integration across motor domains, showing that complex alterations to sensory feedback can successfully drive changes relevant to ecological behavior.