Previous studies showed that manipulating the speech production system influenced speech perception. This influence was mediated by task difficulty, listening conditions, and attention. In the present study we investigated the specificity of a somatosensory manipulation – a spoon over the tongue – in passive listening. We measured the mismatch negativity (MMN) while participants listened to vowels that differ in their articulation – the tongue height – and familiarity – native and unknown vowels. The same participants heard the vowels in a spoon and no-spoon block. The order of the blocks was counterbalanced across participants. Results showed no effect of the spoon. Instead, starting with the spoon enhanced the MMN amplitude. A second experiment showed the same MMN enhancement for starting with a somatosensory manipulation applied to a non-articulator – the hand. This result suggests that starting a study with a somatosensory manipulation raises attention to the task.

This research was funded by grants from the European Commission Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013): ERC grant agree¬ment number 323961 (UNDER CONTROL); Cooperation grant agreement num¬ber 613465 – (AThEME); the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (PSI2012 34071) and the Catalan Government (SGR 2014–1210) awarded to NSG. She also received the "ICREA Acadèmia" prize for excellence in research, funded by the Generalitat de Catalunya. BD received funding from the People Programme (Marie Curie Actions) of the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under REA grant agreement number 32867 and a postdoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Government (Juan de la Cierva fellowship JCI-2012-12678).