Assessing speech perception in children with language difficulties: Effects of background noise and phonetic contrast

Abstract

Deficits in speech perception are reported for some children with language impairments. This deficit is more marked when listening against background noise. This study investigated the speech perception skills of young children with and without language difficulties. A speech discrimination task, using non-word minimal pairs in an XAB paradigm, was presented to 20 5-7-year-old children with language difficulties and 33 typically-developing (TD) children aged between 4- to 7-years. Stimuli were presented in quiet and in background noise (babble), and stimuli varied in phonetic contrasts, differing in either place of articulation or presence/absence of voicing. Children with language difficulties performed less well than TD children in all conditions. There was an interaction between group and noise condition, such that children with language difficulties were more affected by the presence of noise. Both groups of children made more errors with one voicing contrast /s z/ and there was some indication that children with language difficulties had proportionately greater difficulty with this contrast. Speech discrimination scores were significantly correlated with language scores for children with language difficulties. Issues in developing material for assessment of speech discrimination in children with LI are discussed.

Individual differences in language and working memory affect children’s speech recognition in noise

“…The ELU model would make a similar, but more general prediction that language abilities, including vocabulary, support word recognition in noise. There is support for both models in the literature, as children with higher scores on standardised tests of vocabulary have stronger speech recognition abilities in noise or conditions of stimulus degradation than peers with lower vocabulary in some studies (Garlock et al, 2001; Munson, 2001; Vance et al, 2009; McCreery & Stelmachowicz, 2011; Vance & Martindale, 2012). However, in other studies (Eisenberg et al, 2000; Stelmachowicz et al, 2000; Nittrouer et al, 2013), vocabulary has not been a consistent predictor of word recognition under degraded conditions.…”

Speech Perception in Noise by Children With Cochlear Implants

“…In 1983, Brady, Shankweiler, and Mann showed that children with dyslexia recognized words in noise more poorly than their peers with normal hearing (NH), even though recognition scores in quiet were comparable across groups. This finding was attributed to poor phonological category formation on the part of the children with dyslexia, and work since then has supported that suggestion (e.g., Serniclaes, Ventura, Morais, & Kolinsky, 2005; Vance & Martindale, 2011). Other studies have found that individuals with reading problems have difficulty creating categories from sensory inputs, regardless of whether they are related to speech (Ahissar, Lubin, Putter-Katz, & Banai, 2006; Nittrouer, Shune, & Lowenstein, 2011).…”

Background Noise Degrades Central Auditory Processing in Toddlers

“…Younger children are more vulnerable to noise than older ones (Wilson et al 2010;Newman 2011;Prodi et al 2013). In addition, school-age children with linguistic problems are even more sensitive to noise than typically developing children (Ziegler et al 2011;Vance & Martindale 2012) and thereby more vulnerable to the negative effects of noise. In addition, school-age children with linguistic problems are even more sensitive to noise than typically developing children (Ziegler et al 2011;Vance & Martindale 2012) and thereby more vulnerable to the negative effects of noise.…”