Marcel R Giezen1, Paola Escudero, Anne Baker. 1. Amsterdam Center for Language and Communication, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. m.r.giezen@uva.nl
Abstract
PURPOSE: This study examined the use of different acoustic cues in auditory perception of consonant and vowel contrasts by profoundly deaf children with a cochlear implant (CI) in comparison to age-matched children and young adults with normal hearing. METHOD: A speech sound categorization task in an XAB format was administered to 15 children ages 5-6 with a CI (mean age at implant: 1;8 [years;months]), 20 normal-hearing age-matched children, and 21 normal-hearing adults. Four contrasts were examined: //-/a/, /i/-/i/, /bu/-/pu/, and /fu/-/su/. Measures included phoneme endpoint identification, individual cue reliance, cue weighting, and classification slope. RESULTS: The children with a CI used the spectral cues in the /fu/-/su/ contrast less effectively than the children with normal hearing, resulting in poorer phoneme endpoint identification and a shallower classification slope. Performance on the other 3 contrasts did not differ significantly. Adults consistently showed steeper classification slopes than the children, but similar cue-weighting patterns were observed in all 3 groups. CONCLUSIONS: Despite their different auditory input, children with a CI appear to be able to use many acoustic cues effectively in speech perception. Most importantly, children with a CI and normal-hearing children were observed to use similar cue-weighting patterns.
PURPOSE: This study examined the use of different acoustic cues in auditory perception of consonant and vowel contrasts by profoundly deaf children with a cochlear implant (CI) in comparison to age-matched children and young adults with normal hearing. METHOD: A speech sound categorization task in an XAB format was administered to 15 children ages 5-6 with a CI (mean age at implant: 1;8 [years;months]), 20 normal-hearing age-matched children, and 21 normal-hearing adults. Four contrasts were examined: //-/a/, /i/-/i/, /bu/-/pu/, and /fu/-/su/. Measures included phoneme endpoint identification, individual cue reliance, cue weighting, and classification slope. RESULTS: The children with a CI used the spectral cues in the /fu/-/su/ contrast less effectively than the children with normal hearing, resulting in poorer phoneme endpoint identification and a shallower classification slope. Performance on the other 3 contrasts did not differ significantly. Adults consistently showed steeper classification slopes than the children, but similar cue-weighting patterns were observed in all 3 groups. CONCLUSIONS: Despite their different auditory input, children with a CI appear to be able to use many acoustic cues effectively in speech perception. Most importantly, children with a CI and normal-hearing children were observed to use similar cue-weighting patterns.
Authors: Aaron C Moberly; Joanna H Lowenstein; Eric Tarr; Amanda Caldwell-Tarr; D Bradley Welling; Antoine J Shahin; Susan Nittrouer Journal: J Speech Lang Hear Res Date: 2014-04-01 Impact factor: 2.297
Authors: Ferenc Bunta; C Elizabeth Goodin-Mayeda; Amanda Procter; Arturo Hernandez Journal: J Speech Lang Hear Res Date: 2016-08-01 Impact factor: 2.297