Measures of the ecological loudness of speech
Abstract
Most laboratory studies of binaural loudness summation show ample amounts of summation (e.g., a tone presented binaurally is clearly louder than the same tone presented monaurally), but classroom demonstrations of this phenomenon in typical daily environments yield negligible loudness summation for most listeners. To gain insight into this difference, experiments were performed with different degrees of ecological validity. Statistical analysis indicates that the most ecologically valid condition results in less binaural loudness summation than traditional laboratory procedures. Implications for normal-hearing listeners and impaired listeners with hearing aids are discussed.
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