Proximate factors associated with speech intelligibility in children with cochlear implants: A preliminary study

The purpose of this descriptive pilot study was to examine possible relationships among speech intelligibility and structural characteristics of speech in children who use cochlear implants. The Beginners Intelligibility Test (BIT) was administered to 10 children with cochlear implants, and the intelligibility of the words in the sentences was judged by panels of naïve adult listeners. Additionally, several qualitative and quantitative measures of word omission, segment correctness, duration, and intonation variability were applied to the sentences used to assess intelligibility. Correlational analyses were conducted to determine if BIT scores and the other speech parameters were related. There was a significant correlation between BIT score and percent words omitted, but no other variables correlated significantly with BIT score. The correlation between intelligibility and word omission may be task-specific as well as reflective of memory limitations.