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Published on: February 10, 2016
Informational and energetic masking effects in the perception of multiple simultaneous talkers
D S Brungart1, B D Simpson, M A Ericson
1Air Force Research Laboratory, Human Effectiveness Directorate, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio 45433, USA. douglas.brungart@wpafb.af.mil
Listeners can better understand speech in noisy environments by using monaural cues, such as voice characteristics and relative loudness. These factors help segregate target speech from competing sounds, improving speech perception.
Area of Science:
- Auditory perception
- Speech processing
- Psychoacoustics
Background:
- Binaural cues are well-studied for speech segregation.
- Monaural and diotic speech segregation cues are less understood.
- Understanding these cues is crucial for hearing in complex acoustic environments.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate monaural factors influencing speech segregation in multi-talker diotic stimuli.
- To examine the impact of relative talker levels and voice characteristics on target speech intelligibility.
- To determine how listeners extract target information from competing speech.
Main Methods:
- Experiments used diotic stimuli with 3- or 4-talker competing speech.
- Varied relative levels of target and masking talkers.
- Manipulated voice characteristics (same-sex vs. different-sex talkers).
- Assessed intelligibility of a target phrase.
Main Results:
- Speech intelligibility decreased as target talker level decreased relative to maskers.
- Intelligibility was lower when target and masker voices had similar characteristics.
- Different-sex talkers generally improved intelligibility compared to same-sex talkers.
- Prior exposure to target voice characteristics improved performance.
Conclusions:
- Monaural factors, including relative level and voice characteristics, significantly impact speech segregation.
- Listeners utilize these monaural cues to separate target speech in multi-talker situations.
- Findings highlight the importance of monaural processing in understanding speech in noise.
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