Exploring the Sentence Length and Age of Acquisition of Speech Recognition Test Sentences in Dutch, American English, and Canadian French

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the differences between the age of acquisition (AoA) and sentence length of sentences of the speech recognition (SR) tests for adults and children in Dutch, American English, and Canadian French. Method: The AoA and sentence length of the sentences of four SR tests for adults and children were determined. One-way analyses of variance were performed to assess differences between the tests. Results: The AoA and sentence length of the sentences significantly differed between the SR tests for adults. These differences were also found between the SR tests for children. Conclusions: The AoA and the sentence length differ across the SR tests in Dutch, American English, and Canadian French. The Dutch sentences have higher AoA and are longer than the sentences in American English and Canadian French. The effect of the linguistic complexity on sentence repetition accuracy should be investigated during the development and validation of a Dutch SR test for children.