Temporal and spectral cue use for initial plosive voicing perception by hearing-impaired children and normal-hearing children and adults

Author(s): Hazan, V., Revoile, S. G., Edward, D. A., Droge, J.

Journal/Book: Eur J Disorder Commun. 1995; 30: 7 Bath Place, London, England EC2A 3DR. College Speech & Language Therapists. 417-434.

Abstract: The influence of voice-onset time (VOT) and vowel-onset characteristics on the perception of the voicing contrast for initial plosive consonants was examined for hearing-impaired children, and normal-hearing children and adults. Listeners identified spoken 'DAD'-'TAD' stimuli controlled for VOT and vowel onset characteristics. Only six of 16 hearing-impaired children appropriately identified the exemplar DAD and TAD stimuli used as endpoints of VOT continua. For this group of six hearing-impaired children, a longer VOT than for the normal-hearing listeners was required to elicit /t/ rather than /d/ percepts. The VOT region of perceptual cross-over in labelling widened progressively from normal-hearing adults to normal-hearing children to hearing-impaired children. Generally, longer VOTs were required to yield /t/ perception in the context of the DAD vowel than with the TAD vowel. These 'vowel stem' effects on VOT boundary were inconsistent for the hearing-impaired children, and weaker for the normal-hearing children than for the adults. These spoken stimuli produced results for VOT cue use that generally parallel those obtained in studies with synthetic stimuli.

Note: Article LD Holdenpitt, Gallaudet Univ, Ctr Auditory & Speech Sci, Mary Thornberry Bldg, 800 Florida Ave NE, Washington, DC 20002 USA

Keyword(s): plosive voicing perception; hearing impaired; voice-onset time; acoustic cues; STOP CONSONANTS; SPEECH; DISTINCTION; LISTENERS; CONTRAST

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