Measurement of speech in noise abilities in laboratory and real-world noise

Abstract

Aim: The present study aimed to investigate speech in noise perception abilities in normal-hearing adults using different types of noise (i.e., speech babble, traffic noise, and speech spectrum noise) and at different signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) (i.e., +5 dB, 0 dB, −5 dB, and −10 dB). Methods: A total of 109 individuals with mean age of 23 years were participated in the study. All participants had English as second language and Telugu as native and first language. English disyllabic words (Hrish et al.) were used as speech stimuli under different noises and different SNRs. Results: Results have shown that for any type of noise the speech perception scores changed with the variance in SNRs, the scores have decreased when the SNRs were decreased from 0 dB to −10 dB SNR, and the scores have increased when SNRs increased from 0 dB to +5 dB SNR. Conclusion: From this study, it can be concluded that speech perception score in noise depends on the type of noise used in testing the speech in noise abilities. This factor is very important in the selection of the noise type when measuring speech perception in the presence of noise. It was also seen that change in noise level also had a different impact on speech perception in noise abilities.