Modelling the combined effect of binaural hearing and reverberation

Authors

  • Birger Kollmeier Centre for Hearing Research, Medizinische Physik, Universität Oldenburg, D-26111 Oldenburg, Germany; Fraunhofer Project group for Hearing, Speech and Audio Technology, Marie-Curie-Str. 2, D-26129 Oldenburg, Germany
  • Jan Rennies Fraunhofer Project group for Hearing, Speech and Audio Technology, Marie-Curie-Str. 2, D-26129 Oldenburg, Germany
  • Anna Warzybok Centre for Hearing Research, Medizinische Physik, Universität Oldenburg, D-26111 Oldenburg, Germany
  • Thomas Brand Centre for Hearing Research, Medizinische Physik, Universität Oldenburg, D-26111 Oldenburg, Germany

Abstract

To study the interaction between the intelligibility advantage in rooms due to the presence of early reflections and due to the binaural blocking of interferers from undesired directions, a series of speech reception threshold (SRT) experiments was performed in a simulated room and with a single early reflection of the frontal target speech source as a function of its delay ranging from 0 to 200 ms. From the data and the model considerations given here, one can conclude that binaural unmasking and temporal integration of reflections seem to be comparatively independent from each other, thus providing evidence for a model with a binaural processing stage as a frontend and a reverberation compensation stage (like the MTF model) as the subsequent, independent stage. However, a blocking effect was found for reflections ipsilateral to the noise direction and a release from the deterioration effect at 200 ms delay was found for all non-blocked reflections from azimuths deviating from the midline. These findings are at odds with three versions of a model of binaural speech intelligibility in rooms described here.

References

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Additional Files

Published

2011-12-15

How to Cite

Kollmeier, B., Rennies, J., Warzybok, A., & Brand, T. (2011). Modelling the combined effect of binaural hearing and reverberation. Proceedings of the International Symposium on Auditory and Audiological Research, 3, 295–306. Retrieved from https://proceedings.isaar.eu/index.php/isaarproc/article/view/2011-34

Issue

Vol. 3 (2011): Speech Perception and Auditory Disorders

Section

2011/3. Models of speech processing and perception

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