CASL
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://eresearch.qmu.ac.uk/handle/20.500.12289/22
Browse
2 results
Search Results
Item The effect of hearing loss on the intelligibility of synthetic speech(2007-08) Wolters, Maria; Campbell, Pauline; DePlacido, Christine; Liddell, Amy; Owens, David; This research was funded by the EPSRC/BBSRC initiative SPARC and by the SFC grant MATCH (grant no. HR04016).Many factors affect the intelligibility of synthetic speech. One aspect that has been severely neglected in past work is hearing loss. In this study, we investigate whether pure-tone audiometry thresholds across a wide range of frequencies (0.25-20kHz) are correlated with participants' performance on a simple task that involves accurately recalling and processing reminders. Participants' scores correlate not only with thresholds in the frequency ranges commonly associated with speech, but also with extended high-frequency thresholds.Item Making Speech Synthesis More Accessible to Older People.(2007-08) Wolters, Maria; Campbell, Pauline; DePlacido, Christine; Liddell, Amy; Owens, DavidIn this paper, we report on an experiment that tested users' ability to understand the content of spoken auditory reminders. Users heard meeting reminders and medication reminders spoken in both a natural and a synthetic voice. Our results show that older users can understand synthetic speech as well as younger users provided that the prompt texts are well-designed, using familiar words and contextual cues. As soon as unfamiliar and complex words are introduced, users' hearing affects how well they can understand the synthetic voice, even if their hearing would pass common screening tests for speech synthesis experiments. Although hearing thresholds correlate best with users' performance, central auditory processing may also influence performance, especially when complex errors are made.