Effects of Monaural Asymmetry and Target–Masker Similarity on Binaural Advantage in Children and Adults With Normal Hearing

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (8) ◽  
pp. 2811-2824
Author(s):  
Ji-Sheng Liu ◽  
Ya-Feng Yu ◽  
Duo-Duo Tao ◽  
Yi Li ◽  
Fei Ye ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sex Differences ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Language Development ◽  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Chinese Adults ◽  
Adults And Children ◽  
Binaural Listening ◽  
Competing Speech

Purpose For colocated targets and maskers, binaural listening typically offers a small but significant advantage over monaural listening. This study investigated how monaural asymmetry and target–masker similarity may limit binaural advantage in adults and children. Method Ten Mandarin-speaking Chinese adults (aged 22–27 years) and 12 children (aged 7–14 years) with normal hearing participated in the study. Monaural and binaural speech recognition thresholds (SRTs) were adaptively measured for colocated competing speech. The target–masker sex was the same or different. Performance was measured using headphones for three listening conditions: left ear, right ear, and both ears. Binaural advantage was calculated relative to the poorer or better ear. Results Mean SRTs were significantly lower for adults than children. When the target–masker sex was the same, SRTs were significantly lower with the better ear than with the poorer ear or both ears ( p < .05). When the target–masker sex was different, SRTs were significantly lower with the better ear or both ears than with the poorer ear ( p < .05). Children and adults similarly benefitted from target–masker sex differences. Substantial monaural asymmetry was observed, but the effects of asymmetry on binaural advantage were similar between adults and children. Monaural asymmetry was significantly correlated with binaural advantage relative to the poorer ear ( p = .004), but not to the better ear ( p = .056). Conclusions Binaural listening may offer little advantage (or even a disadvantage) over monaural listening with the better ear, especially when competing talkers have similar vocal characteristics. Monaural asymmetry appears to limit binaural advantage in listeners with normal hearing, similar to observations in listeners with hearing impairment. While language development may limit perception of competing speech, it does not appear to limit the effects of monaural asymmetry or target–masker sex on binaural advantage.

scholarly journals Tinnitus impairs segregation of competing speech in normal-hearing listeners

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yang Wenyi Liu ◽  
Bing Wang ◽  
Bing Chen ◽  
John J. Galvin ◽  
Qian-Jie Fu
Keyword(s):  
Sex Differences ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Auditory Processing ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Central Auditory Processing ◽  
Informational Masking ◽  
Spatial Cues ◽  
Processing Resources ◽  
Lexical Interference ◽  
Competing Speech

AbstractMany tinnitus patients report difficulties understanding speech in noise or competing talkers, despite having “normal” hearing in terms of audiometric thresholds. The interference caused by tinnitus is more likely central in origin. Release from informational masking (more central in origin) produced by competing speech may further illuminate central interference due to tinnitus. In the present study, masked speech understanding was measured in normal hearing listeners with or without tinnitus. Speech recognition thresholds were measured for target speech in the presence of multi-talker babble or competing speech. For competing speech, speech recognition thresholds were measured for different cue conditions (i.e., with and without target-masker sex differences and/or with and without spatial cues). The present data suggest that tinnitus negatively affected masked speech recognition even in individuals with no measurable hearing loss. Tinnitus severity appeared to especially limit listeners’ ability to segregate competing speech using talker sex differences. The data suggest that increased informational masking via lexical interference may tax tinnitus patients’ central auditory processing resources.

Further Validation of the Speech Transmission Index (STI)

1987 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 403-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry E. Humes ◽  
Stephen Boney ◽  
Faith Loven
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Background Noise ◽  
Recognition Task ◽  
Sound Field ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Noise Levels ◽  
Transmission Index ◽  
Speech Transmission ◽  
Binaural Listening ◽  
Prospective Analyses

The present article further evaluates the accuracy of speech-recognition predictions made according to two forms of the Speech Transmission Index (STI) for normal-hearing listeners. The first portion of this article describes the application of the modified Speech Transmission Index (mSTI) to an extensive set of speech-recognition data. Performance of normal-hearing listeners on a nonsense-syllable recognition task in 216 conditions involving different speech levels, background noise levels, reverberation times and filter passbands was found to be monotonically related to the mSTI. The second portion of this article describes a retrospective and prospective analysis of an extended sound-field version of the STI, referred to here as STI x . This extended STI considers many of the variables relevant to sound-field speech recognition, some of which are not incorporated in the mSTI. These variables include: (a) reverberation time; (b) speech level; (e) noise level; (d) talker-to-listener distance; (e) directivity of the speech source; and (f) directivity of the listener (eg., monaural vs. binaural listening). For both the retrospective and prospective analyses, speech-recognition was found to vary monotonically with STI x .

Segregation of competing speech in adults and children with normal hearing and in children with cochlear implants

2021 ◽  
Vol 150 (1) ◽  
pp. 339-352
Author(s):  
Ji-Sheng Liu ◽  
Yang-Wenyi Liu ◽  
Ya-Feng Yu ◽  
John J. Galvin ◽  
Qian-Jie Fu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cochlear Implants ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Adults And Children ◽  
Competing Speech

scholarly journals Comparison of Speech Recognition and Subjective Hearing Handicap in Elderly Listeners as a Function of Degree of Hearing Loss

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-123
Author(s):  
KyooSang Kim ◽  
Subong Kim ◽  
Jae Hee Lee
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Individual Variability ◽  
Psychological Aspects ◽  
World Health ◽  
Large Individual ◽  
Hearing Handicap

Purpose: This study aimed to compare objective speech recognition and subjective hearing handicap outcomes as a function of a degree of hearing loss. Methods: 120 elderly listeners participated, ranging in age from 60-83 years. Listeners’ degrees of hearing loss were derived corresponding to a newly proposed World Health Organization hearing impairment grading system. As objective outcomes, word and sentence recognition scores (WRS, SRS) in quiet were measured at an individually determined most comfortable level. The SRS in noise were obtained at 0 dB signal-to-noise ratio. The Korean Evaluation Scale for Hearing Handicap questionnaire for non-hearing aid users was used to evaluate the effects of hearing status on social and psychological aspects. Results: Within the same grading of hearing impairment, listeners tended to show a large individual variability in speech-in-noise recognition and subjective hearing handicaps. Listeners with even mild impairment had more reductions in SRS in noise and more handicaps in an interpersonal relationship compared to normal-hearing listeners. Among the listeners with no impairment or mild hearing impairment, listeners who had poorer sentence-in-noise scores actually showed greater hearing handicaps. The sentence-in-noise scores plus WRS explained the subjective hearing handicap by about 40%. Conclusion: The elderly with normal hearing or mild hearing loss can have reduced communication abilities in background noise, resulting in a negative effect on their social and psychological aspects. It is recommended to conduct the sentence-in-noise intelligibility test and the subjective hearing handicap survey as a standard audiometric measures to confirm the functional communication problems for the elderly.

Adaptation of the BKB-SIN Test for Use as a Pediatric Aided Outcome Measure

2011 ◽  
Vol 22 (06) ◽  
pp. 375-386 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stella L. Ng ◽  
Christine N. Meston ◽  
Susan D. Scollie ◽  
Richard C. Seewald
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Hearing Aids ◽  
Outcome Measure ◽  
Signal To Noise Ratio ◽  
Outcome Measurement ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Signal To Noise ◽  
Directional Microphone ◽  
Adults And Children ◽  
Noise Ratio

Background: There is a need for objective pediatric hearing aid outcome measurement and thus a need for the evaluation of outcome measures. We explored a commercially available pediatric sentence-in-noise measure adapted for use as an aided outcome measure. Purpose: The purposes of the current study were (1) to administer an adapted BKB-SIN (Bamford-Kowal-Bench Speech-in-Noise test) to adults and children who have normal hearing and children who use hearing aids and (2) to evaluate the utility of this adapted BKB-SIN as an aided, within-subjects outcome measure for amplification strategies. Research Design: We used a mixed within and between groups design to evaluate speech recognition in noise for the three groups of participants. The children who use hearing aids were tested under the omnidirectional, directional, and digital noise reduction (DNR) conditions. Results from each group were compared to each other, and we compared results of each aided condition for the children who use hearing aids to evaluate the test utility as an aided outcome measure. Study Sample: The study sample consisted of 14 adults with normal hearing (aged 22–28 yr) and 15 children with normal hearing (aged 6–18 yr), recruited through word of mouth, and 14 children who use hearing aids (aged 9–16 yr) recruited from local audiology clinics. Data Collection and Analysis: List pairs of the BKB-SIN test were presented at 50 dB HL as follows: four list pairs to each participant with normal hearing, four list pairs in the omnidirectional condition, and two list pairs in the directional and DNR conditions. Children who use hearing aids were fitted bilaterally with laboratory devices and completed the BKB-SIN test aided. Data were plotted as mean percent of key words correct at each signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Further, we conducted an analysis of variance for group differences and within-groups for the three aided conditions. Results: Adult participants outperformed children with normal hearing, who outperformed the children who use hearing aids. SNR-50 (signal-to-noise ratio at which listener can obtain a speech recognition score of 50% correct) scores demonstrated reliability of the adapted test implementation. The BKB-SIN test measured significant differences in performance for omnidirectional versus directional microphone conditions but not between omnidirectional and DNR conditions. Conclusions: We conclude that the adapted implementation of the BKB-SIN test can be administered reliably and feasibly. Further study is warranted to develop norms for the adapted implementation as well as to determine if an adapted implementation can be sensitive to age effects. Until such norms are developed, clinicians should refrain from comparing results from the adapted test to the test manual norms and should instead use the adapted implementation as a within-subject measure.

Accuracy of Speech Intelligibility Index Predictions for Noise-Masked Young Listeners With Normal Hearing and for Elderly Listeners With Hearing Impairment

1995 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 234-243 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah E. Hargus ◽  
Sandra Gordon-Salant
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
Speech Intelligibility ◽  
Predictive Accuracy ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Auditory Sensitivity ◽  
Test Conditions ◽  
Speech Test ◽  
Speech Intelligibility Index ◽  
Speech Presentation

This study examined whether the accuracy of Speech Intelligibility Index (SII) predictions is affected by subject age when between-groups auditory sensitivity differences are controlled. SII predictive accuracy was assessed for elderly listeners with hearing impairment (EHI) and for young noise-masked listeners with normal hearing (NMN). SII predictive accuracy was poorer for the EHI subjects than for the NMN subjects across a range of test conditions and stimuli. Speech test redundancy, speech presentation level, signal-to-babble ratio, and babble level also affected SII predictive accuracy. The results suggest that the speech recognition difficulties experienced in noise by elderly listeners do not result solely from reduced auditory sensitivity.

F0 Processing and the Seperation of Competing Speech Signals by Listeners With Normal Hearing and With Hearing Loss

1998 ◽  
Vol 41 (6) ◽  
pp. 1294-1306 ◽  
Author(s):  
Van Summers ◽  
Marjorie R. Leek
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Steady State ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Speech Signals ◽  
Group Level ◽  
Competing Speech

Normal-hearing and hearing-impaired listeners were tested to determine F0 difference limens for synthetic tokens of 5 steady-state vowels. The same stimuli were then used in a concurrent-vowel labeling task with the F0 difference between concurrent vowels ranging between 0 and 4 semitones. Finally, speech recognition was tested for synthetic sentences in the presence of a competing synthetic voice with the same, a higher, or a lower F0. Normal-hearing listeners and hearing-impaired listeners with small F0-discrimination (ΔF0) thresholds showed improvements in vowel labeling when there were differences in F0 between vowels on the concurrent-vowel task. Impaired listeners with high ΔF0 thresholds did not benefit from F0 differences between vowels. At the group level, normalhearing listeners benefited more than hearing-impaired listeners from F0 differences between competing signals on both the concurrent-vowel and sentence tasks. However, for individual listeners, ΔF0 thresholds and improvements in concurrent-vowel labeling based on F0 differences were only weakly associated with F0-based improvements in performance on the sentence task. For both the concurrent-vowel and sentence tasks, there was evidence that the ability to benefit from F0 differences between competing signals decreases with age.

scholarly journals Speech-on-speech Masking with Variable Access to the Linguistic Content of the Masker Speech for Native and Nonnative English Speakers

2014 ◽  
Vol 25 (04) ◽  
pp. 355-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Calandruccio ◽  
Ann R. Bradlow ◽  
Sumitrajit Dhar
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Speech Signal ◽  
Mixed Model ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Nonnative English Speakers ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
Masking Release ◽  
Accented English ◽  
Competing Speech

Background: Masking release for an English sentence-recognition task in the presence of foreign-accented English speech compared with native-accented English speech was reported in Calandruccio et al (2010a). The masking release appeared to increase as the masker intelligibility decreased. However, it could not be ruled out that spectral differences between the speech maskers were influencing the significant differences observed. Purpose: The purpose of the current experiment was to minimize spectral differences between speech maskers to determine how various amounts of linguistic information within competing speech affect masking release. Research Design: A mixed-model design with within-subject (four two-talker speech maskers) and between-subject (listener group) factors was conducted. Speech maskers included native-accented English speech and high-intelligibility, moderate-intelligibility, and low-intelligibility Mandarin-accented English. Normalizing the long-term average speech spectra of the maskers to each other minimized spectral differences between the masker conditions. Study Sample: Three listener groups were tested, including monolingual English speakers with normal hearing, nonnative English speakers with normal hearing, and monolingual English speakers with hearing loss. The nonnative English speakers were from various native language backgrounds, not including Mandarin (or any other Chinese dialect). Listeners with hearing loss had symmetric mild sloping to moderate sensorineural hearing loss. Data Collection and Analysis: Listeners were asked to repeat back sentences that were presented in the presence of four different two-talker speech maskers. Responses were scored based on the key words within the sentences (100 key words per masker condition). A mixed-model regression analysis was used to analyze the difference in performance scores between the masker conditions and listener groups. Results: Monolingual English speakers with normal hearing benefited when the competing speech signal was foreign accented compared with native accented, allowing for improved speech recognition. Various levels of intelligibility across the foreign-accented speech maskers did not influence results. Neither the nonnative English-speaking listeners with normal hearing nor the monolingual English speakers with hearing loss benefited from masking release when the masker was changed from native-accented to foreign-accented English. Conclusions: Slight modifications between the target and the masker speech allowed monolingual English speakers with normal hearing to improve their recognition of native-accented English, even when the competing speech was highly intelligible. Further research is needed to determine which modifications within the competing speech signal caused the Mandarin-accented English to be less effective with respect to masking. Determining the influences within the competing speech that make it less effective as a masker or determining why monolingual normal-hearing listeners can take advantage of these differences could help improve speech recognition for those with hearing loss in the future.

Speech Recognition in Background Noise: Monaural versus Binaural Listening Conditions in Normal-hearing Patients

2001 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 625-630 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pekka Persson ◽  
Henrik Harder ◽  
Stig Arlinger ◽  
Bengt Magnuson
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Background Noise ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Binaural Listening

Speech Recognition in Fluctuating and Continuous Maskers

2004 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 245-256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Van Summers ◽  
Michelle R. Molis
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Group Differences ◽  
Hearing Sensitivity ◽  
Sentence Recognition ◽  
Performance Differences ◽  
Overall Performance ◽  
Low Amplitude ◽  
Processing Differences ◽  
Competing Speech

Listeners with normal-hearing sensitivity recognize speech more accurately in the presence of fluctuating background sounds, such as a single competing voice, than in unmodulated noise at the same overall level. These performance differences are greatly reduced in listeners with hearing impairment, who generally receive little benefit from fluctuations in masker envelopes. If this lack of benefit is entirely due to elevated quiet thresholds and the resulting inaudibility of low-amplitude portions of signal + masker, then listeners with hearing impairment should derive increasing benefit from masker fluctuations as presentation levels increase. Listeners with normal-hearing (NH) sensitivity and listeners with hearing impairment (HI) were tested for sentence recognition at moderate and high presentation levels in competing speech-shaped noise, in competing speech by a single talker, and in competing time-reversed speech by the same talker. NH listeners showed more accurate recognition at moderate than at high presentation levels and better performance in fluctuating maskers than in unmodulated noise. For these listeners, modulated versus unmodulated performance differences tended to decrease at high presentation levels. Listeners with HI, as a group, showed performance that was more similar across maskers and presentation levels. Considered individually, only 2 out of 6 listeners with HI showed better overall performance and increasing benefit from masker fluctuations as presentation level increased. These results suggest that audibility alone does not completely account for the group differences in performance with fluctuating maskers; suprathreshold processing differences between groups also appear to play an important role. Competing speech frequently provided more effective masking than time-reversed speech containing temporal fluctuations of equal magnitude. This finding is consistent with "informational" masking resulting from competitive processing of words and phrases within the speech masker that would not occur for time-reversed sentences.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document