Effect of masker type on native and non-native consonant perception in noise

Lecumberri, Ma Luisa Garcia; Cooke, Martin

doi:10.1121/1.2180210

Cited by 198 publications

(231 citation statements)

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“…Van Engen and Bradlow (2007) recently showed that the language used as masker can affect the intelligibility of target speech: sentence recognition is poorer when the background babble is the same language as the one of the target speech compared to when they are different (see also Garcia Lecumberri andCooke, 2006 andRhebergen et al, 2005 for similar findings). Although these results provide evidence for informational masking in the form of linguistic interference, the exact linguistic features that contribute to this effect are still unspecified.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 53%

Real-time lexical competitions during speech-in-speech comprehension

Boulenger

Hoen

Ferragne

et al. 2010

Speech Communication

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This study aimed at characterizing the cognitive processes that come into play during speech-inspeech comprehension by examining lexical competitions between target speech and concurrent multi-talker babble. We investigated the effects of number of simultaneous talkers (2, 4, 6 or 8) and of the token frequency of the words that compose the babble (high or low) on lexical decision to target words. Results revealed a decrease in performance as measured by reaction times to targets with increasing number of concurrent talkers. Crucially, the frequency of words in the babble significantly affected performance: high-frequency babble interfered more strongly (by lengthening reaction times) with word recognition than low-frequency babble. This informational masking was particularly salient when only two talkers were present in the babble due to the availability of identifiable lexical items from the background. Our findings suggest that speech comprehension in multi-talker babble can trigger competitions at the lexical level between target and background. They further highlight the importance of investigating speechin-speech comprehension situations as they may provide crucial information on interactive and competitive mechanisms that occur in real-time during word recognition.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 53%

Real-time lexical competitions during speech-in-speech comprehension

Boulenger

Hoen

Ferragne

et al. 2010

Speech Communication

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“…These results indicate that even very skilled non-native listeners may have difficulty understanding speech in the presence of reverberation. (Bradlow & Bent, 2002;Cooke, Lecumberri, & Barker, 2008;Cutler, Lecumberri, & Cooke, 2008;Golestani, Rosen, & Scott, 2009;Lecumberri & Cooke, 2006;Rosenhouse et al, 2006;Shimizu, Makishima, Yoshida, & Yamagishi, 2002). Researchers using babble noise have investigated single-talker babble noise (see, e.g., Brungart, 2001), multi-talker babble noise (as in Simpson & Cooke, 2005), or speech played in reverse (e.g., Moll et al, 2001.…”

Section: Distortion and Noisementioning

confidence: 99%

What makes listening difficult? Factors affecting second language listening comprehension

Bloomfield¹,

Wayland²,

Rhoades³

et al. 2010

150

120

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Factors affecting second language listening comprehension gies-that is, those who are aware of and use effective strategies, such as avoiding mental translation-demonstrate better L2 listening comprehension. 2 In addition to these general cognitive abilities, a number of factors pertaining to experience with the L2 influence listening skill. These factors include the amount of prior exposure to the language; familiarity with and an ability to understand the non-native language's phonology; vocabulary size; and background knowledge about the topic, text, structure, schema, and culture.Familiarity with the L2 changes the extent to which the L2 listener uses top-down or bottom-up strategies in listening. For example, expert listeners use both types of strategies: They are able to accurately make sense of the speech signal (bottom-up information) 3 and integrate this information with PurPose-To establish what is currently known about factors that affect foreign language listening comprehension, with a focus on characteristics of the listener, passage, and testing conditions.ConClusions-Research on second language (L2) listening comprehension strongly supports the importance of a number of factors, for example, a listener's working memory capacity and the number of ideas in a passage. Much of the research, however, reports weak or inconclusive results, leaving many factors and complex interactions among factors unresolved and in need of further investigation.relevanCe-Identifying the factors that affect L2 listening comprehension will help Defense Language Institute Proficiency Test (DLPT) designers anticipate how qualities of selected authentic materials will impact listening comprehension. Executive Summary PurPoseThe U.S. Government administers the Defense Language Proficiency Test (DLPT) to military linguists and other government personnel to assess their listening and reading comprehension in a number of foreign languages, including critical languages such as Mandarin, Modern Standard Arabic, Egyptian Arabic, and Persian Farsi. The DLPT is updated every 10 to 15 years, and the most recent transition-from DLPT IV to DLPT5-included a greater emphasis on testing listening comprehension with authentic materials. In turn, this has led to a growing interest in the factors that make second language (L2) listening difficult.To examine these factors, CASL reviewed the current scientific literature and summarized the characteristics of listeners, passages, and testing conditions. The review targeted features of particular interest to stakeholders at the Defense Language Institute (DLI). The long-term goal of the project is to support the selection of authentic listening materials that accurately reflect different proficiency levels. ConClusionsAlthough the available research on L2 listening comprehension is limited, CASL's literature review identified several factors that affect listening comprehension. These factors are summarized below and in Tables 1, 2, and 3. 1 Characteristics of the listenerUnderstanding a fo...

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“…Infants have limited experience with their native language. In this regard, they may be more comparable to second-language learners than to native adult speakers of a language, and several studies suggest that second-language learners have particular difficulties comprehending speech in noise or in the presence of other speech (Cooke, Garcia Lecumberri, & Barker, 2008;Garcia Lecumberri & Cooke, 2006;Mayo, Florentine, & Buus, 1997;Takata & Nábelek, 1990).…”

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confidence: 99%

Infants’ listening in multitalker environments: Effect of the number of background talkers

Newman

2009

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics

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Infants are often spoken to in the presence of background sounds, including speech from other talkers. In the present study, we compared 5-and 8.5-month-olds' abilities to recognize their own names in the context of three different types of background speech: that of a single talker, multitalker babble, and that of a single talker played backward. Infants recognized their names at a 10-dB signal-to-noise ratio in the multiple-voice condition but not in the single-voice (nonreversed) condition, a pattern opposite to that of typical adult performance. Infants similarly failed to recognize their names when the background talker's voice was reversed-that is, unintelligible, but with speech-like acoustic properties. These data suggest that infants may have difficulty segregating the components of different speech streams when those streams are acoustically too similar. Alternatively, infants' attention may be drawn to the time-varying acoustic properties associated with a single talker's speech, causing difficulties when a single talker is the competing sound.

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Effect of masker type on native and non-native consonant perception in noise

Cited by 198 publications

References 30 publications

Real-time lexical competitions during speech-in-speech comprehension

Real-time lexical competitions during speech-in-speech comprehension

What makes listening difficult? Factors affecting second language listening comprehension

Infants’ listening in multitalker environments: Effect of the number of background talkers

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