Speech perception of children with cochlear implants and children with traditional hearing aids

Abstract

The aim of the study was to analyse speech perception of children with cochlear implants (N = 29) and children fitted with traditional hearing aids (N = 20). One- and two-syllable words were presented auditorily in a forced choice minimal-pair discrimination task. The children repeated the word and pointed to the appropriate picture presented on computer screen. The words were minimal pairs with respect to voicing or place of articulation in stops and fricatives; among affricates the minimal pairs included the most frequently substituted fricatives and stops in addition to voicing and place of articulation. Vowel discrimination was tested in minimal pairs and in nonsense words differing only in the vowel. Unaided, all children were profoundly hearing impaired and were included in auditory-oral therapy (Verbotonal method). The smallest differences between the groups were found for stops and vowels, and the largest for fricatives and affricates. The implanted children were significantly more successful.

Early Listening and Speaking Skills Predict Later Reading Proficiency in Pediatric Cochlear Implant Users

“…Additionally, Geers (2003) reported that a considerable amount of the variance in reading scores of children who use CIs could be accounted for by child and family variables as well as speech and language variables. Studies also find that the CI provides better access to speech for most children, and this access results in improved speech perception and production (Mildner, et al, 2006;Peng, et al, 2004;Tobey, et al, 2003).…”

Narrative Comprehension Abilities of Children with Typical Hearing and Children Using Hearing Aids: A Pilot Study

“…Speech sound production skills were assessed with the GoldmanFristoe Test of Articulation-2 (GFTA-2; Goldman & Fristoe, 2000). Speech sound production errors involving sounds differing by one phonetic feature (e.g., /d/ vs. /g/) are common in children with hearing loss and could potentially lead researchers to incorrectly interpret verbal responses (Mildner, Sindija, & Zrinski, 2006). Therefore, this testing was completed so researchers could be confident that the verbal responses provided by both groups of children were being accurately decoded by examiners.…”

Acoustic characteristics of vowels and plosives/affricates of Mandarin-speaking hearing-impaired children

“…Support for this assumption can be found in studies of children with CIs, which tend to find that speech perception improves more with earlier implantation (Blamey, Sarant, Paatsch, Barry, Bow, Wales, Wright, Psarros, Rattigan, and Tooher, 2001b;Wu and Yang, 2003;Mildner, Šindija, and Zerinski, 2006). In a study of Mandarin-speaking hearing-impaired children, Wu and Yang (2003) concluded that speech perception improved over a 2-year follow-up period, with improvements negatively correlated with the age at implantation and positively correlated with the duration of implant use.…”