An exploratory investigation of speech recognition thresholds in noise with auralisations of two reverberant rooms

Kuusinen, Antti; Saariniemi, Eero; Sivonen, Ville; Dietz, Aarno; Aarnisalo, Antti A.; Lokki, Tapio

doi:10.1080/14992027.2020.1817993

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…They also assigned an additional task that had the participants guess which category the sentence belonged in out of a total of 20 sentences grouped into two categories (short and long RT conditions). Kuusinen et al (2020) [29] also found no significant difference in speech recognition thresholds influenced by reverberation. The discrepancy might be originated from source-listener distance (typically 1 m).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 93%

Recall of Reverberant Speech in Quiet and Four-Talker Babble Noise

et al. 2021

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Using behavioral evaluation of free recall performance, we investigated whether reverberation and/or noise affected memory performance in normal-hearing adults. Thirty-four participants performed a free-recall task in which they were instructed to repeat the initial word after each sentence and to remember the target words after each list of seven sentences, in a 2 (reverberation) × 2 (noise) factorial design. Pupil dilation responses (baseline and peak pupil dilation) were also recorded sentence-by-sentence while the participants were trying to remember the target words. In noise, speech was presented at an easily audible level using an individualized signal-to-noise ratio (95% speech intelligibility). As expected, recall performance was significantly lower in the noisy environment than in the quiet condition. Regardless of noise interference or reverberation, sentence- baseline values gradually increased with an increase in the number of words to be remembered for a subsequent free-recall task. Long reverberation time had no significant effect on memory retrieval of verbal stimuli or pupillary responses during encoding.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 93%

Recall of Reverberant Speech in Quiet and Four-Talker Babble Noise

et al. 2021

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“…Unfortunately, the situation deteriorates significantly for those with hearing problems, including the aging population [ 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 ]. Harris and Swenson assessed speech intelligibility for people with and without sensorineural hearing impairment in three acoustic environments [ 33 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Acoustic Sensing Analytics Applied to Speech in Reverberation Conditions

Odya

Kotus

Kurowski

et al. 2021

Sensors

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The paper aims to discuss a case study of sensing analytics and technology in acoustics when applied to reverberation conditions. Reverberation is one of the issues that makes speech in indoor spaces challenging to understand. This problem is particularly critical in large spaces with few absorbing or diffusing surfaces. One of the natural remedies to improve speech intelligibility in such conditions may be achieved through speaking slowly. It is possible to use algorithms that reduce the rate of speech (RoS) in real time. Therefore, the study aims to find recommended values of RoS in the context of STI (speech transmission index) in different acoustic environments. In the experiments, speech intelligibility for six impulse responses recorded in spaces with different STIs is investigated using a sentence test (for the Polish language). Fifteen subjects with normal hearing participated in these tests. The results of the analytical analysis enabled us to propose a curve specifying the maximum RoS values translating into understandable speech under given acoustic conditions. This curve can be used in speech processing control technology as well as compressive reverse acoustic sensing.

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An Acoustic Way to Support Japanese Children’s Effective English Learning in School Classrooms

et al. 2021

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In this paper, the importance of implementing good acoustic conditions in classrooms using sound amplification systems is investigated to support more effective English education for elementary school children. To date, the failure of educating English as a second language at Japanese schools has been demonstrated by poor English conversation ability of those who completed a compulsory six-year English language course at Japanese junior-high and high schools (age 12–18). To amend the situation, teaching English became compulsory at grade three (age 8–9) and above at most Japanese elementary schools in the 2020 academic year. We conducted acoustic measurements of two types of sound amplification systems, a pair of PC loudspeakers and another with a loudspeaker array, in a typical classroom at an elementary school in Japan. We also analysed English listening test results of 216 Japanese native children (age 11–12) who were learning English in their usual classes in Japan, to compare the effects of those two systems. Results of logistic regression analysis adjusted by the discrimination difficulty of word pairs demonstrated the statistically significant association between correct answer rate of the English tests and classroom acoustic factors. Although, on average, upgrading the sound amplification system had positive effects on the correct answer rate, it also had a negative impact when the word pairs had English phoneme contrasts that do not appear in Japanese phoneme structure. Combined with the acoustic measurements’ results, it was also revealed that heterogeneous sound fields that depend on seat positions could be compensated using sound amplification systems with loudspeaker arrays. Our findings suggest that improvement of both acoustic quality and teaching methods is required for children to acquire English communication skills effectively in their classroom.

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An exploratory investigation of speech recognition thresholds in noise with auralisations of two reverberant rooms

Cited by 3 publications

References 67 publications

Recall of Reverberant Speech in Quiet and Four-Talker Babble Noise

Recall of Reverberant Speech in Quiet and Four-Talker Babble Noise

Acoustic Sensing Analytics Applied to Speech in Reverberation Conditions

An Acoustic Way to Support Japanese Children’s Effective English Learning in School Classrooms

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