title: Children's perception of speech produced in a two-talker background.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This study evaluated the degree to which children benefit from the acoustic modifications made by talkers when they produce speech in noise.
  
  
  METHODS
  A repeated measures design compared the speech perception performance of children (5-11 years) and adults in a 2-talker masker. Target speech was produced in a 2-talker background or in quiet. In Experiment 1, recognition with the 2 target sets was assessed using an adaptive spondee identification procedure. In Experiment 2, the benefit of speech produced in a 2-talker background was assessed using an open-set, monosyllabic word recognition task at a fixed signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Children performed more poorly than adults, regardless of whether the target speech was produced in quiet or in a 2-talker background. A small improvement in the SNR required to identify spondees was observed for both children and adults using speech produced in a 2-talker background (Experiment 1). Similarly, average open-set word recognition scores were 11 percentage points higher for both age groups using speech produced in a 2-talker background compared with quiet (Experiment 2).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results indicate that children can use the acoustic modifications of speech produced in a 2-talker background to improve masked speech perception, as previously demonstrated for adults.
authors.forename: Mallory
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Baker
authors.forename: Emily
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Buss
authors.forename: Adam
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Jacks
authors.forename: Crystal
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Taylor
authors.forename: Lori J
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Leibold
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D000328:Adult; D001302:Audiometry, Speech; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009622:Noise; D046709:Pattern Recognition, Physiological; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D021641:Recognition, Psychology; D013061:Speech Acoustics; D013067:Speech Perception