Behavioral auditory–motor interaction in speech reveals a striking individual difference: while some individuals readily synchronize their produced syllabic rhythm with the perceived one (high synchronizers), others show impaired synchronization (low synchronizers). The mechanisms underlying this distinction remain debated. One account attributes it to differences in the strength of sensorimotor coupling, whereas an alternative proposes differences in the relative contributions of feedback and feedforward control.
Here, using an online protocol, we evaluated participants with an adapted version of the Battery for the Assessment of Auditory Sensorimotor and Timing Abilities (BAASTA) and found that high synchronizers exhibit both stronger synchronization during paced tapping tasks and greater rhythmic stability during unpaced tapping tasks. Crucially, we adapted a biophysical model in which motor behavior is represented as an oscillator coupled to sensory input, and simulated individuals as differing in coupling strength. The simulations closely match the empirical observations, demonstrating that stronger sensorimotor coupling is sufficient to reproduce the observed differences in speech synchronization.
We thank Rebeca Hernández Soto for her insightful discussions and valuable feedback on this study. We also acknowledge ChatGPT for assisting with language refinement and proofreading. Importantly, the manuscript was written entirely by the authors, with AI used solely as a tool to enhance clarity and fluency, as all authors are non-native English speakers.
This work was supported by DGAPA-PAPIIT, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), grants IA200223 and IN206825 (M.F.A.), and by the IBRO Parenthood Grant 2025 (M.F.A.). CM-A is a doctoral student of the Programa de Doctorado en Ciencias Biomédicas at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) and has received a fellowship (2086755) from Secretaría de Ciencias, Humanidades, Tecnología e Innovación (SECIHTI, formerly CONAHCYT). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Instituto de Neurobiología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Querétaro, 76230, México Carlos Magallanes-Aranda & M. Florencia Assaneo The authors declare no competing interests. Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
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