title: Enhancing listener strategies using a payoff matrix in speech-on-speech masking experiments.
abstract: Speech recognition was measured as a function of the target-to-masker ratio (TMR) with syntactically similar speech maskers. In the first experiment, listeners were instructed to report keywords from the target sentence. Data averaged across listeners showed a plateau in performance below 0 dB TMR when masker and target sentences were from the same talker. In this experiment, some listeners tended to report the target words at all TMRs in accordance with the instructions, while others reported keywords from the louder of the sentences, contrary to the instructions. In the second experiment, stimuli were the same as in the first experiment, but listeners were also instructed to avoid reporting the masker keywords, and a payoff matrix penalizing masker keywords and rewarding target keywords was used. In this experiment, listeners reduced the number of reported masker keywords, and increased the number of reported target keywords overall, and the average data showed a local minimum at 0 dB TMR with same-talker maskers. The best overall performance with a same-talker masker was obtained with a level difference of 9 dB, where listeners achieved near perfect performance when the target was louder, and at least 80% correct performance when the target was the quieter of the two sentences.
authors.affiliation: Battlespace Acoustics Branch, Air Force Research Laboratory, 2610 Seventh Street B441, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio 45433, USA.
authors.forename: Eric R
authors.initials: ER
authors.lastname: Thompson
authors.affiliation: Battlespace Acoustics Branch, Air Force Research Laboratory, 2610 Seventh Street B441, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio 45433, USA.
authors.forename: Nandini
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Iyer
authors.affiliation: Battlespace Acoustics Branch, Air Force Research Laboratory, 2610 Seventh Street B441, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio 45433, USA.
authors.forename: Brian D
authors.initials: BD
authors.lastname: Simpson
authors.affiliation: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA.
authors.forename: Gregory H
authors.initials: GH
authors.lastname: Wakefield
authors.affiliation: Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA.
authors.forename: David E
authors.initials: DE
authors.lastname: Kieras
authors.affiliation: Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, 8901 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, Maryland 20889, USA.
authors.forename: Douglas S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Brungart
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D001302:Audiometry, Speech; D032882:Comprehension; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009622:Noise / Q000009:adverse effects*; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D021641:Recognition, Psychology; D012737:Sex Factors; D013065:Speech Intelligibility; D013067:Speech Perception; D055815:Young Adult