Effects of aging on response criteria in speech-recognition tasks

This study examined whether young and elderly listeners exhibit different response criteria on speech-recognition tasks. Young and elderly listeners with normal hearing and with matched mild hearing losses were evaluated on Northwestern University Test No. 6 (Tillman & Carhart, 1966) and the California Consonant Test (Owens & Schubert, 1977) presented at 80 dB SPL and 95 dB SPL. The level of the multitalker babble background was adjusted individually to the signal-to-babble ratio at which the listener achieved 50% criterion performance. Significant differences between the performances of young and elderly listeners were observed on the response bias measure (B) but not on the percent-correct or sensitivity [P(A)] measures. Elderly listeners exhibited less cautious response criteria than did younger listeners. The implications of these results to communication strategies of elderly listeners are discussed.