Interpreting word-recognition data using the NAM and phonemic features

Authors

  • Rachel McArdle Auditory Research Laboratory (126), Bay Pines VA Healthcare System, Bay Pines, Florida, 33744, USA; Department of Communicative Disorders and Sciences, University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida, 33620, USA
  • Richard H. Wilson Auditory Research Laboratory (126), James H. Quillen VA Medical Center, Mountain Home, Tennessee, 37684, USA; Departments of Surgery and Communicative Disorders, East Tennessee State University, Johnson City, Tennessee, 37614, USA

Abstract

The goal of this project was to examine acoustic and non-acoustic variables that may predict the relative ease or difficulty with which monosyllabic words presented in speech-spectrum noise are recognized. For the analysis, the 50% correct recognition data from the 24 listeners with normal hearing who participated in the Wilson and McArdle (2007) was used. The following acoustic, phonetic/phonological, and lexical variables were included in the evaluation: (1) rms; (2) duration; (3) consonant features (manner, place, and voicing for initial and nal phoneme); (4) vowel phoneme; (5) word frequency; (6) word familiarity; (7) neighborhood density; and (8) neighborhood frequency. The results showed significant correlations between the acoustic variables (i.e., rms, duration) and the 50% point. The results of the regression analysis found that 45% of the variance associated with the 50% point was accounted for by the acoustic and phonetic/phonological variables (i.e., consonant features, vowel phoneme) whereas only 3% of the variance was accounted for by a single lexical variable (i.e., word familiarity). Word frequency, neighborhood density, and neighborhood frequency were not found to be significant variables in the regression model. These ndings suggest that monosyllabic word-recognition-in-noise is more dependent on bottom-up processing than top-down processing. Thus, monosyllabic words may be more sensitive to changes in audibility when using speech-in-noise testing for rehabilitative outcomes such as in a pre/ post-hearing aid fitting format.

References

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Wilson, R. H., and McArdle, R. A. "Recognition Performance on Single-speaker Recordings of W-22, NU6, & PB-50 by Listeners with Normal Hearing." International Symposium on Auditory and Audiological Research, Helsingør, Denmark (2007).

Additional Files

Published

2007-12-15

How to Cite

McArdle, R., & Wilson, R. H. (2007). Interpreting word-recognition data using the NAM and phonemic features. Proceedings of the International Symposium on Auditory and Audiological Research, 1, 441–448. Retrieved from https://proceedings.isaar.eu/index.php/isaarproc/article/view/2007-43

Issue

Section

2007/4. Speech perception and processing