[Dichotic listening test in Spanish: pairs of disyllabic words]

Spanish dichotic listening tests make use of either monosyllabic words or single syllables. Here we present a dichotic listening test with 19 pairs of two-syllable words, since this type of words is more in accordance with the syllabic structure of the Spanish language.

The test was applied to a total of 164 psychology students. Two studies were carried out--one exploratory and the other to obtain test-retest reliability. Responses were obtained with a distinction being made between four visual distractors. In the first study, up to two of the four alternatives could be chosen. In the second study, a single response was imposed and the test was performed twice with a gap of 15 days between sessions.

Significant right ear advantage was observed both in the first study (t(39) = -9.57, p < 0.0001) and in the second (t(37) = -11.75, p < 0.0001). When the sample was separated into right-handed and left-handed subjects, significant differences between their medians were obtained in the first study with respect to the laterality index (t(14) = 2.23, p < 0.04). The test-retest correlation was found to be highly significant (r = 0.88, p < 0.0001).

The present test appears to be a good indicator of laterality and we have implemented a computer program that allows us to modify the time intervals between pairs of stimuli and to obtain the laterality indexes automatically. Thus, the test can be used in a wide range of clinical populations.