Speech Recognition in Noise for Adults With Normal Hearing: Age-Normative Performance for AzBio, BKB-SIN, and QuickSIN

Abstract

Objective: Characterize performance for adults aged 20 to 79 years with normal hearing on tasks of AzBio, BKB-SIN, QuickSIN, and acoustic Quick Spectral Modulation Detection (QSMD) in the sound field. Setting: Cochlear implant (CI) program. Patients: Eighty-one adults with normal hearing and cognitive function were recruited evenly across four age groups (20–49, 50–59, 60–69, and 70–79 years). Interventions: Subjects completed AzBio sentence recognition testing in quiet and in five signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs: +10, +5, 0, −5, −10 dB), as well as the BKB-SIN, QuickSIN, and QSMD tasks. Main Outcome Measures: AzBio, BKB-SIN, QuickSIN, and acoustic QSMD scores were analyzed to characterize typical sound field performance in an older adult population with normal hearing. Results: AzBio sentence recognition performance approached ceiling for sentences presented at ≥ 0 dB SNR with mean scores ranging from 3.5% at −10 dB SNR to 99% at +10 dB SNR. Mean QuickSIN SNR-50 was −0.02. Mean BKB-SIN SNR-50 was −1.31 dB. Mean acoustic QSMD score was 88%. Performance for all measures decreased with age. Conclusion: Adults with age-normative hearing achieve ceiling-level performance for AzBio sentence recognition at SNRs used for clinical CI and/or HA testing. Thus, these tasks are not inherently contraindicated for older listeners. Older adults with normal hearing, however, demonstrated greater deficits for speech in noise compared to younger listeners—an effect most pronounced at negative SNRs. Lastly, BKB-SIN data obtained in the sound field replicated previous normative data for only the youngest age group, suggesting that new norms should be considered for older populations.

Speech Recognition in Noise Using Binaural Diotic and Antiphasic Digits-in-Noise in Children: Maturation and Self-Test Validity

“…These results are consistent with the current study showing agerelated improvement of DIN SRTs, as are results from other studies investigating speech recognition in noise using different test materials. 26,49,[52][53][54][55] Furthermore, this study confirms that BILD, derived from the diotic and antiphasic DIN, improves with age, as reported previously for Dutch children. 26 A study conducted by Moore et al 56 did not find a significant age effect on BILD.…”

Musical Emotion Perception in Bimodal Patients: Relative Weighting of Musical Mode and Tempo Cues

“…A three-interval, forced choice paradigm was used based on a modified method of constant stimuli, with two intervals consisting of a flat spectrum noise and the remaining interval consisting of a frequency modulated noise. Unlike the task described previously by Gifford et al (2014), this version of the task used a constant modulation rate of 1.0 cyc/oct with 10 modulation depths ranging from 4 to 22 dB, in 2-dB steps (Holder et al, 2018). Sixty trials were completed (6 at each modulation depth).…”

Effect of signal processing strategy and stimulation type on speech and auditory perception in adult cochlear implant users

“…Spectral modulation detection was assessed via the acoustic quick spectral modulation detection (acoustic QSMD, Holder, Levin, and Gifford 2018) task at a calibrated level of 60 dB SPL presented in the soundfield. Participants were presented with a 3-interval forced choice task in which two presentation intervals contained flat spectrum noise and the third was spectrally modulated.…”