“…The long-term average spectrum of speech (LTASS) is a direct measure of the mean sound pressure level of speech as a function of frequency, and provides a global representation of the acoustic characteristics of continuous discourse (Cox & Moore, 1988). The LTASS has been measured for a single subject (e.g., Byrne, 1977;Izdebski, 1980) and the spectra of several individuals have been averaged to characterize the speech of various populations, including: adult males, adult females, children and hearing-impaired adolescents (e.g., Byrne, 1977;Dunn & White, 1940;Formby & Monsen, 1982).…”