The role of spatial separation of two talkers’ auditory stimuli in the listener’s memory of running speech: listening effort in a non-noisy conversational setting

Abstract

Objective To investigate the role of the spatial position of conversing talkers, that is, spatially separated or co-located, in the listener’s short-term memory of running speech and listening effort. Design In two experiments (between-subject), participants underwent a dual-task paradigm, including a listening (primary) task wherein male and female talkers spoke coherent texts. Talkers were either spatially separated or co-located (within-subject). As a secondary task, visually presented tasks were used. Experiment I involved a number-judgement task, and Experiment II entailed switching between number and letter-judgement task. Study sample Twenty-four young adults who reported normal hearing and normal or corrected to normal vision participated in each experiment. They were all students from the RWTH Aachen University. Results In both experiments, similar short-term memory performance of running speech was found independently of talkers being spatially separated or co-located. Performance in the secondary tasks, however, differed between these two talkers’ auditory stimuli conditions, indicating that spatially separated talkers imposed reduced listening effort compared to their co-location. Conclusion The findings indicated that auditory-perceptive information, such as the spatial position of talkers, plays a role in higher-level auditory cognition, that is, short-term memory of running speech, even when listening in quiet.