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The auditory system is essential for sound perception, utilizing various critical structures. When sound waves enter the outer ear, they travel through the ear canal and cause the eardrum to vibrate. These vibrations are then transmitted to the middle ear, where three tiny bones – the malleus, incus, and stapes – amplify the sound. This amplification is crucial, as it ensures that the sound vibrations are strong enough to be conveyed to the inner ear. These vibrations then reach the cochlea, a...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jul 15, 2026

Systematic Hearing Performance Evaluation Process for Adolescents with Cochlear Implantation at Early Ages

Systematic Hearing Performance Evaluation Process for Adolescents with Cochlear Implantation at Early Ages

Published on: March 24, 2023

Evaluation of companding-based spectral enhancement using simulated cochlear-implant processing.

Andrew J Oxenham¹, Andrea M Simonson, Lorenzo Turicchia

¹Research Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA. oxenham@umn.edu

The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America

|April 6, 2007

Summary

A novel companding algorithm improved speech recognition for normal-hearing listeners simulating cochlear-implant processing. This spectral enhancement technique offers potential benefits for current cochlear-implant users.

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Jul 15, 2026

Systematic Hearing Performance Evaluation Process for Adolescents with Cochlear Implantation at Early Ages

Systematic Hearing Performance Evaluation Process for Adolescents with Cochlear Implantation at Early Ages

Published on: March 24, 2023

Area of Science:

Auditory Neuroscience
Signal Processing
Speech Perception

Background:

Cochlear implants (CIs) aim to restore hearing but speech recognition remains a challenge.
Envelope vocoders simulate CI processing, offering a platform to test enhancement algorithms.
A time-domain spectral enhancement algorithm using companding was recently proposed.

Purpose of the Study:

To evaluate the effectiveness of a companding algorithm in improving speech recognition.
To assess the algorithm's performance across different signal-to-noise ratios and vocoder configurations.
To determine the potential benefits of companding for current cochlear-implant users.

Main Methods:

Normal-hearing listeners recognized sentences processed through an envelope vocoder.
Sentences were presented in steady background noise at varying signal-to-noise ratios (0, 3, 6 dB).
The companding algorithm was applied before or during vocoder processing, with variations in filter tuning and time constants.

Main Results:

Companding yielded small but significant improvements in speech reception with an eight-channel vocoder.
Speech intelligibility benefits were robust to filter tuning but decreased with shorter time constants.
Improvements persisted with a sixteen-channel vocoder and a sixteen-channel cochlear-implant simulator.

Conclusions:

The companding algorithm offers a readily implementable method to enhance speech recognition.
This technique shows promise for improving the listening experience of cochlear-implant users.
Further research may optimize companding parameters for maximal benefit in CI users.