| 1. |
- Beechey, Timothy, et al.
(författare)
-
Hearing Aid Amplification Reduces Communication Effort of People With Hearing Impairment and Their Conversation Partners
- 2020
-
Ingår i: Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research. - : American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. - 1092-4388 .- 1558-9102. ; 63:4, s. 1299-1311
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- ObjectivesThis study investigates the hypothesis that hearing aid amplification reduces effort within conversation for both hearing aid wearers and their communication partners. Levels of effort, in the form of speech production modifications, required to maintain successful spoken communication in a range of acoustic environments are compared to earlier reported results measured in unaided conversation conditions.DesignFifteen young adult normal-hearing participants and 15 older adult hearing-impaired participants were tested in pairs. Each pair consisted of one young normal-hearing participant and one older hearing-impaired participant. Hearing-impaired participants received directional hearing aid amplification, according to their audiogram, via a master hearing aid with gain provided according to the NAL-NL2 fitting formula. Pairs of participants were required to take part in naturalistic conversations through the use of a referential communication task. Each pair took part in five conversations, each of 5-min duration. During each conversation, participants were exposed to one of five different realistic acoustic environments presented through highly open headphones. The ordering of acoustic environments across experimental blocks was pseudorandomized. Resulting recordings of conversational speech were analyzed to determine the magnitude of speech modifications, in terms of vocal level and spectrum, produced by normal-hearing talkers as a function of both acoustic environment and the degree of high-frequency average hearing impairment of their conversation partner.ResultsThe magnitude of spectral modifications of speech produced by normal-hearing talkers during conversations with aided hearing-impaired interlocutors was smaller than the speech modifications observed during conversations between the same pairs of participants in the absence of hearing aid amplification.ConclusionsThe provision of hearing aid amplification reduces the effort required to maintain communication in adverse conditions. This reduction in effort provides benefit to hearing-impaired individuals and also to the conversation partners of hearing-impaired individuals. By considering the impact of amplification on both sides of dyadic conversations, this approach contributes to an increased understanding of the likely impact of hearing impairment on everyday communication.
|
|
| 2. |
- Beechey, Timothy, et al.
(författare)
-
Hearing Impairment Increases Communication Effort During Conversations in Noise
- 2020
-
Ingår i: Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research. - : American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. - 1092-4388 .- 1558-9102. ; 63:1, s. 305-320
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- PurposeThis article describes patterns of speech modifications produced by talkers as a function of the degree of hearing impairment of communication partners during naturalistic conversations in noise. An explanation of observed speech modifications is proposed in terms of a generalization of the concept of effort. This account complements existing theories of listening effort by extending the concept of effort to the domain of interactive communication.MethodTwenty young adult normal hearing participants and 20 older adult hearing-impaired participants were tested in pairs. Each pair consisted of 1 young normal hearing participant and 1 older hearing-impaired participant. Pairs of participants took part in naturalistic conversations through the use of a referential communication task. Each pair completed a 5-min conversation in each of 5 different realistic acoustic environments.ResultsTalkers modified their speech, in terms of level and spectrum, in a gradient manner reflecting both the acoustic environment and the degree of hearing impairment of their conversation partner. All pairs of participants were able to maintain communication across all acoustic environments regardless of degree of hearing impairment and the level of environmental noise. Contrasting effects of noise and hearing impairment on speech production revealed distinct patterns of speech modifications produced by normal hearing and hearing-impaired talkers during conversation. This may reflect the fact that only the speech modifications produced by normal hearing talkers functioned to compensate for the hearing impairment of a conversation partner.ConclusionsThe data presented support the concept of communication effort as a dynamic feedback system between conversation participants. Additionally, these results provide insight into the nature of realistic speech signals, which are encountered by people with hearing impairment in everyday communication scenarios.
|
|
| 3. |
- Miles, Kelly M., et al.
(författare)
-
Development of the Everyday Conversational Sentences in Noise test
- 2020
-
Ingår i: Journal of the Acoustical Society of America. - : American Institute of Physics (AIP). - 0001-4966 .- 1520-8524. ; 147:3, s. 1562-1576
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- To capture the demands of real-world listening, laboratory-based speech-in-noise tasks must better reflect the types of speech and environments listeners encounter in everyday life. This article reports the development of original sentence materials that were produced spontaneously with varying vocal efforts. These sentences were extracted from conversations between a talker pair (female/male) communicating in different realistic acoustic environments to elicit normal, raised and loud vocal efforts. In total, 384 sentences were extracted to provide four equivalent lists of 16 sentences at the three efforts for the two talkers. The sentences were presented to 32 young, normally hearing participants in stationary noise at five signal-to-noise ratios from -8 to 0 dB in 2 dB steps. Psychometric functions were fitted for each sentence, revealing an average 50% speech reception threshold (SRT50) of -5.2 dB, and an average slope of 17.2%/dB. Sentences were then level-normalised to adjust their individual SRT50 to the mean (-5.2 dB). The sentences may be combined with realistic background noise to provide an assessment method that better captures the perceptual demands of everyday communication.
|
|
