The Effects of Aging on Speech Perception in Noise: Comparison between Normal-Hearing and Cochlear-Implant Listeners

2014 ◽  
Vol 25 (07) ◽  
pp. 656-665 ◽  
Author(s):  
Su-Hyun Jin ◽  
Chang Liu ◽  
Douglas P. Sladen
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Aging Effect ◽  
Speech Understanding ◽  
Detection Thresholds ◽  
Speech Perception In Noise ◽  
Sentence Recognition ◽  
Hearing Status ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Effects Of Aging ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise

Background: Speech understanding in noise is comparatively more problematic for older listeners with and without hearing loss, and age-related changes in temporal resolution might be associated with reduced speech recognition in complex noise. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of aging on temporal processing and speech perception in noise for normal-hearing (NH) and cochlear-implant (CI) listeners. Research Design: All participants completed three experimental procedures: (1) amplitude modulation (AM) detection thresholds, (2) sentence recognition in quiet, and (3) speech recognition in steady or modulating noise. Study Sample: Four listener groups participated in the study: 11 younger (≤ 30 yr old, YNH) listeners and 12 older (> 60 yr old, ONH) listeners with NH and 7 younger (< 55 yr old, YCI) and 6 older (> 60 yr old, OCI) CI users. CI listeners have been wearing their device either monaurally or binaurally at least 1 yr. Data collection and Analysis: For speech recognition testing, there were eight listening conditions in noise (4 modulation frequencies × 2 signal-to-noise ratios) and one in quiet for each listener. For modulation detection testing, a broadband noise with a duration of 500 msec served as the stimuli at three temporal modulation frequencies of 2, 4, and 8 Hz, which were used to modulate the noise in the speech recognition experiment. We measured AM detection thresholds using a two-interval, two-alternative, forced-choice adaptive procedure. We conducted a series of analysis of variance tests to examine the effect of aging on each test result and measured the correlation coefficient between speech recognition in noise and modulation detection thresholds. Results: Although older NH and CI listeners performed similar to the younger listeners with the same hearing status for sentence recognition in quiet, there was a significant aging effect on speech recognition in noise. Regardless of modulation frequency and signal-to-noise ratio, speech recognition scores of the older listeners were poorer than those of the younger listeners when hearing status was matched. We also found a significant effect of aging on AM detection at each modulating frequency and a strong correlation between speech recognition in modulating noise and AM detection thresholds at 2 and 4 Hz. Conclusions: Regardless of differences in hearing status, the degree and pattern of aging effect on auditory processing of the NH listener groups were similar to those of the CI listener groups. This result suggests that age-related declines in speech understanding are likely multifactorial, including peripheral and central factors. Although the age cutoff of the current older age group was 10 yr less than in previous studies (Dubno et al, 2002; Lin et al, 2011), we still found the age-related differences on two auditory tasks. This study extends the knowledge of age-related auditory perception difficulties to CI listeners.

scholarly journals Age-related differences in binaural masking level differences: behavioral and electrophysiological evidence

2018 ◽  
Vol 120 (6) ◽  
pp. 2939-2952 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samira Anderson ◽  
Robert Ellis ◽  
Julie Mehta ◽  
Matthew J. Goupell
Keyword(s):  
Aging Effect ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Behavioral Experiment ◽  
Spatial Cues ◽  
Sound Sources ◽  
Frequency Following Response ◽  
Binaural Processing ◽  
Threshold Difference ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Effects Of Aging

The effects of aging and stimulus configuration on binaural masking level differences (BMLDs) were measured behaviorally and electrophysiologically, using the frequency-following response (FFR) to target brainstem/midbrain encoding. The tests were performed in 15 younger normal-hearing (<30 yr) and 15 older normal-hearing (>60 yr) participants. The stimuli consisted of a 500-Hz target tone embedded in a narrowband (50-Hz bandwidth) or wideband (1,500-Hz bandwidth) noise masker. The interaural phase conditions included NoSo (tone and noise presented interaurally in-phase), NoSπ (noise presented interaurally in-phase and tone presented out-of-phase), and NπSo (noise presented interaurally out-of-phase and tone presented in-phase) configurations. In the behavioral experiment, aging reduced the magnitude of the BMLD. The magnitude of the BMLD was smaller for the NoSo–NπSo threshold difference compared with the NoSo–NoSπ threshold difference, and it was also smaller in narrowband compared with wideband conditions, consistent with previous measurements. In the electrophysiology experiment, older participants had reduced FFR magnitudes and smaller differences between configurations. There were significant changes in FFR magnitude between the NoSo to NoSπ configurations but not between the NoSo to NπSo configurations. The age-related reduction in FFR magnitudes suggests a temporal processing deficit, but no correlation was found between FFR magnitudes and behavioral BMLDs. Therefore, independent mechanisms may be contributing to the behavioral and neural deficits. Specifically, older participants had higher behavioral thresholds than younger participants for the NoSπ and NπSo configurations but had equivalent thresholds for the NoSo configuration. However, FFR magnitudes were reduced in older participants across all configurations. NEW & NOTEWORTHY Behavioral and electrophysiological testing reveal an aging effect for stimuli presented in wideband and narrowband noise conditions, such that behavioral binaural masking level differences and subcortical spectral magnitudes are reduced in older compared with younger participants. These deficits in binaural processing may limit the older participant's ability to use spatial cues to understand speech in environments containing competing sound sources.

scholarly journals Longitudinal Speech Recognition in Noise in Children: Effects of Hearing Status and Vocabulary

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth A. Walker ◽  
Caitlin Sapp ◽  
Jacob J. Oleson ◽  
Ryan W. McCreery
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Hearing Status ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise

scholarly journals Does Sentence-Level Coarticulation Affect Speech Recognition in Noise or a Speech Masker?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Brandi Jett ◽  
Emily Buss ◽  
Virginia Best ◽  
Jacob Oleson ◽  
Lauren Calandruccio
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Target Type ◽  
Regression Analyses ◽  
Sentence Recognition ◽  
Beneficial Effects ◽  
Noise Masker ◽  
Sentence Level ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise ◽  
Main Effects

Purpose Three experiments were conducted to better understand the role of between-word coarticulation in masked speech recognition. Specifically, we explored whether naturally coarticulated sentences supported better masked speech recognition as compared to sentences derived from individually spoken concatenated words. We hypothesized that sentence recognition thresholds (SRTs) would be similar for coarticulated and concatenated sentences in a noise masker but would be better for coarticulated sentences in a speech masker. Method Sixty young adults participated ( n = 20 per experiment). An adaptive tracking procedure was used to estimate SRTs in the presence of noise or two-talker speech maskers. Targets in Experiments 1 and 2 were matrix-style sentences, while targets in Experiment 3 were semantically meaningful sentences. All experiments included coarticulated and concatenated targets; Experiments 2 and 3 included a third target type, concatenated keyword-intensity–matched (KIM) sentences, in which the words were concatenated but individually scaled to replicate the intensity contours of the coarticulated sentences. Results Regression analyses evaluated the main effects of target type, masker type, and their interaction. Across all three experiments, effects of target type were small (< 2 dB). In Experiment 1, SRTs were slightly poorer for coarticulated than concatenated sentences. In Experiment 2, coarticulation facilitated speech recognition compared to the concatenated KIM condition. When listeners had access to semantic context (Experiment 3), a coarticulation benefit was observed in noise but not in the speech masker. Conclusions Overall, differences between SRTs for sentences with and without between-word coarticulation were small. Beneficial effects of coarticulation were only observed relative to the concatenated KIM targets; for unscaled concatenated targets, it appeared that consistent audibility across the sentence offsets any benefit of coarticulation. Contrary to our hypothesis, effects of coarticulation generally were not more pronounced in speech maskers than in noise maskers.

scholarly journals The Relationship between Random Gap Detection and Hearing in Noise Test Performances

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (10) ◽  
pp. 948-954 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paige Heeke ◽  
Andrew J. Vermiglio ◽  
Emery Bulla ◽  
Keerthana Velappan ◽  
Xiangming Fang
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Temporal Resolution ◽  
Time Interval ◽  
Gap Detection ◽  
Speech Understanding ◽  
Noise Performance ◽  
Hearing In Noise ◽  
Noise Test ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractTemporal acoustic cues are particularly important for speech understanding, and past research has inferred a relationship between temporal resolution and speech recognition in noise ability. A temporal resolution disorder is thought to affect speech understanding abilities because persons would not be able to accurately encode these frequency transitions, creating speech discrimination errors even in the presence of normal pure-tone hearing.The primary purpose was to investigate the relationship between temporal resolution as measured by the Random Gap Detection Test (RGDT) and speech recognition in noise performance as measured by the Hearing in Noise Test (HINT) in adults with normal audiometric thresholds. The second purpose was to examine the relationship between temporal resolution and spatial release from masking.The HINT and RGDT protocols were administered under headphones according to the guidelines specified by the developers. The HINT uses an adaptive protocol to determine the signal-to-noise ratio where the participant recognizes 50% of the sentences. For HINT conditions, the target sentences were presented at 0° and the steady-state speech-shaped noise and a four-talker babble (4TB) was presented at 0°, +90°, or −90° for noise front, noise right, and noise left conditions, respectively. The RGDT is used to evaluate temporal resolution by determining the smallest time interval between two matching stimuli that can be detected by the participant. The RGDT threshold is the shortest time interval where the participant detects a gap. Tonal (0.5, 1, 2, and 4 kHz) and click stimuli random gap subtests were presented at 60 dB HL. Tonal subtests were presented in a random order to minimize presentation order effects.Twenty-one young, native English-speaking participants with normal pure-tone thresholds (≤25 dB HL for 500–4000 Hz) participated in this study. The average age of the participants was 20.2 years (SD = 0.66).Spearman rho correlation coefficients were conducted using SPSS 22 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY) to determine the relationships between HINT and RGDT thresholds and derived measures (spatial advantage and composite scores). Nonparametric testing was used because of the ordinal nature of RGDT data.Moderate negative correlations (p < 0.05) were found between eight RGDT and HINT threshold measures and a moderate positive correlation (p < 0.05) was found between RGDT click thresholds and HINT 4TB spatial advantage. This suggests that as temporal resolution abilities worsened, speech recognition in noise performance improved. These correlations were not statistically significant after the p value reflected the Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons.The results of the present study imply that the RGDT and HINT use different temporal processes. Performance on the RGDT cannot be predicted from HINT thresholds or vice versa.

Psychoacoustic and Demographic Factors for Speech Recognition of Older Adult Cochlear Implant Users

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (6) ◽  
pp. 1712-1725
Author(s):  
Xin Luo ◽  
Courtney Kolberg ◽  
Kathryn R. Pulling ◽  
Tamiko Azuma
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Cochlear Implant ◽  
Discrimination Performance ◽  
Demographic Factors ◽  
Small Sample ◽  
Gap Detection ◽  
Sentence Recognition ◽  
Speech Reception Thresholds ◽  
Effects Of Aging ◽  
Better Than

Purpose This study aimed to evaluate the effects of aging and cochlear implant (CI) on psychoacoustic and speech recognition abilities and to assess the relative contributions of psychoacoustic and demographic factors to speech recognition of older CI (OCI) users. Method Twelve OCI users, 12 older acoustic-hearing (OAH) listeners age-matched to OCI users, and 12 younger normal-hearing (YNH) listeners underwent tests of temporal amplitude modulation detection, temporal gap detection in noise, and spectral–temporal modulated ripple discrimination. Speech reception thresholds were measured for sentence recognition in multitalker, speech-babble noise. Results Statistical analyses showed that, for the small sample of OAH listeners, the degree of hearing loss did not significantly affect any outcome measure. Temporal resolution, spectral resolution, and speech recognition all significantly degraded with both age and the use of a CI (i.e., YNH better than OAH and OAH better than OCI performance). Although both were significantly correlated with OCI users' speech recognition, the duration of CI use no longer had a significant effect on speech recognition once the effect of spectral–temporal ripple discrimination performance was taken into account. For OAH listeners, the only significant predictor of speech recognition was temporal gap detection performance. Conclusion The preliminary results suggest that speech recognition of OCI users may improve with longer duration of CI use, mainly due to higher perceptual acuity to spectral–temporal modulated ripples in acoustic stimuli.

scholarly journals Speech Perception in Complex Acoustic Environments: Developmental Effects

2017 ◽  
Vol 60 (10) ◽  
pp. 3001-3008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lori J. Leibold
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Time Course ◽  
Auditory Masking ◽  
Current State ◽  
Developmental Effects ◽  
Hearing Status ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Acoustic Environments ◽  
Competing Speech ◽  
Age Related Changes

Purpose The ability to hear and understand speech in complex acoustic environments follows a prolonged time course of development. The purpose of this article is to provide a general overview of the literature describing age effects in susceptibility to auditory masking in the context of speech recognition, including a summary of findings related to the maturation of processes thought to facilitate segregation of target from competing speech. Method Data from published and ongoing studies are discussed, with a focus on synthesizing results from studies that address age-related changes in the ability to perceive speech in the presence of a small number of competing talkers. Conclusions This review provides a summary of the current state of knowledge that is valuable for researchers and clinicians. It highlights the importance of considering listener factors, such as age and hearing status, as well as stimulus factors, such as masker type, when interpreting masked speech recognition data. Presentation Video http://cred.pubs.asha.org/article.aspx?articleid=2601620

scholarly journals Genetic hearing impairment affects cochlear processing and, consequently, speech recognition in noise

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cris Lanting ◽  
Ad Snik ◽  
Joop Leijendeckers ◽  
Arjan Bosman ◽  
Ronald Pennings
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Speech Perception ◽  
Animal Studies ◽  
Genetic Defects ◽  
Speech Perception In Noise ◽  
Cochlear Processing ◽  
Genetic Hearing Loss ◽  
Patient Groups ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise

AbstractThe relation between speech recognition and hereditary hearing loss is not straightforward. Impaired cochlear processing of sound might be determined by underlying genetic defects. Data obtained in nine groups of patients with a specific type of genetic hearing loss were evaluated. For each group, the affected cochlear structure, or site-of-lesion, was determined based on previously published animal studies. Retrospectively obtained speech recognition scores in noise were related to several aspects of supra-threshold cochlear processing, as assessed by psychophysical measurements. The differences in speech perception in noise between these patient groups could be explained by these factors, and partially by the hypothesized affected structure of the cochlea, suggesting that speech recognition in noise was associated with genetics-related malfunctioning of the cochlea.

Age-Related and Gender-Related Changes in Monaural Speech Recognition

1997 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 444-452 ◽  
Author(s):  
Judy R. Dubno ◽  
Fu-Shing Lee ◽  
Lois J. Matthews ◽  
John H. Mills
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Speech Perception In Noise ◽  
Auditory Thresholds ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Monosyllabic Words ◽  
Partial Correlations ◽  
Noise Test ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Age Related Changes

Previous studies of older listeners suggest age-related declines in speech recognition. However, the interpretation of these results is not straightforward because auditory thresholds, which account for the largest proportion of the variance in speech-recognition scores, also vary considerably with age. Here, effects of age, gender, and auditory thresholds on several measures of speech recognition were assessed for a large sample of individuals enrolled in a longitudinal study of agerelated hearing loss. Participants ranged in age from 55–84 years. They were evaluated with a battery of conventional audiometric measures and speechrecognition materials, including NU-6 monosyllabic words, Synthetic Sentence Identification sentences, and high-context and low-context sentences from the Speech Perception in Noise test. Two analyses were conducted to assure that changes in speech-recognition scores with age were examined independently of age-related changes in auditory thresholds. In the first analysis, no significant differences in speech recognition were observed for individuals in three age groups (55–64, 65–74, 75–84 years) who were selected so that average puretone thresholds for the groups were within 5 dB. In the second analysis, using partial correlations to adjust both score and age for their association with average thresholds, significant declines with age were observed for males in maximum word recognition, maximum synthetic sentence identification, and keyword recognition in high-context sentences. For females, no significant changes in speech recognition with age were observed for any test.

scholarly journals Age-Related Differences in Lexical Access Relate to Speech Recognition in Noise

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Carroll ◽  
Anna Warzybok ◽  
Birger Kollmeier ◽  
Esther Ruigendijk
Keyword(s):  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Lexical Access ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Speech Recognition In Noise

Speech Recognition in Quiet and Noise in Borderline Cochlear Implant Candidates

2007 ◽  
Vol 18 (10) ◽  
pp. 872-882 ◽  
Author(s):  
Farah Mohd Alkaf ◽  
Jill B. Firszt
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Speech Recognition ◽  
Cochlear Implant ◽  
Hearing Aid ◽  
Detection Thresholds ◽  
Bilateral Hearing Loss ◽  
Sentence Recognition

The present study 1) examined speech recognition at three intensity levels and in noise for adults with bilateral hearing loss who wore amplification and were referred for cochlear implant evaluation but did not meet current audiological criteria, and 2) compared their performance to cochlear implant recipients using current implant technology. When tested at 70 dB SPL, hearing aid subjects' word and sentence recognition scores were similar to or greater than the scores of cochlear implant recipients. Compared to their implanted peers, however, subjects' scores were significantly poorer at normal (60 dB SPL) and soft (50 dB SPL) presentation levels for words and at soft levels for sentences; detection thresholds were also significantly poorer at 1000 Hz and above. The assessment of candidates at louder-than-normal levels (i.e., 70 dB SPL) may not correctly portray their day-to-day communication struggles. El presente estudio examina, (1) el reconocimiento del lenguaje a tres niveles de intensidad en adultos con hipoacusia bilateral que usaban amplificación y que fueron referidos para una evaluación de implante coclear, pero que no cumplieron con los criterios audiológicos actuales, y (2) compara el desempeño de sujetos implantados utilizando la tecnología actual de implantes. Cuando se evaluaron a 70 dB SPL, los puntajes de los sujetos con audífonos para reconocimiento de palabras y frases fueron similares o mejores que los puntajes de los sujetos con implante coclear. Comparado con los implantados, sin embargo, los puntajes de los sujetos amplificados fueron significativamente peores a niveles de presentación normales (60 dB SPL) y suaves (50 dB SPL), y a niveles bajos para frases; los umbrales de detección fueron también significativamente bajos a 1000 Hz y en frecuencias mayores. La evaluación de candidatos a niveles por encima del normal (p.e., 70 dB SPL) puede no representar correctamente las dificultades de comunicación cotidianas.

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