In this paper, effects of irrelevant background speech and speech-simulating noise on working memory were investigated. In two experiments which were carried out in Germany and Japan using the same procedure, with totally 12 volunteers serving as subjects,-we tested the long-term effects of habituation to the background sound by repeating the experimental sessions three times with intervals of about one week. Using a serial recall task it could be shown that natural background speech impaired significantly the performance. This result is corresponding with former results found by other researchers. Speechsimulating noise, however, did not reveal any effects. The reasons for this lack of effects are discussed. Most important, however, is the finding that there is clearly no effect of habituation to the background speech. While the overall performance is improved by repeating the experimental sessions, the effects of the experimental background sounds are stable. This result is interpreted in terms of an information-processing approach to the orienting reflex theory. The practical implications of the results are discussed as well.
Emotional expression of four levels of six kinds of sound (aircraft noise, train noise, road traffic noise, speech, music and construction noise) was examined using the method of selected description in five countries-Japan, Sweden, West Germany, China and the U.S. Subject were asked to select the adjectives which they thought appropriate for expressing the impression of each sound. Using the method of selected description, the differences and similarities between sound sources and use of adjectives were expressed more clearly than when conventional semantic differential was used. On the basis of the adjectives selected and cluster analysis, it was found for sounds used in this experi mentthat "loud" in Japan, Sweden and China has neutral connotations while "loud" in Germany and the U.S. has negative connotations. It was also suggested that "noisy" and "annoying" are not differentiated in Japan, while in the other four countries these two adjectives are differentially used.
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