Abstract
Vibrotactile vocoders have long been viewed as a possible method for conveying speech information to deaf perceivers. However, modest levels of speech transmission have led to numerous alternative notions concerning limitations of vibrotactile devices. This study investigated whether perceived acoustic phonetic structure is preserved in the transformation of the F2 speech region via a linear vibrotactile vocoder array. In experiment 1, naive hearing subjects discriminated pairs of vibrotactile word stimuli immediately before and after 2 h of practice. At both times, relative vibrotactile discrimination levels were well predicted by identification of phonemes presented by an analogous F2 acoustic vocoder, suggesting that structure is preserved. In experiment 2, subjects separately rated auditory and vibrotactile consonant similarity of stimuli presented by auditory and vibrotactile vocoders, respectively. Analysis of phonological feature information showed similarities and differences in perceptual structure across modalities. Vibrotactile stimuli were rated to be more similar to each other than were auditory stimuli, suggesting that phonetic information was degraded relative to auditory information. Based on these results, current investigations are directed at methods for inducing perceptual learning of vibrotactile phonetic information. [Work supported by NIH/NIDCD 00695.]
Published Version
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call