SPEECH PERCEPTION UNDER NONOPTIMAL CONDITIONS IN AGING

描述：(改编自申请人的摘要。)减值 能够在困难的听力条件下理解对话， 例如在高度混响房间或在几个 人们同时说话，会影响到很大一部分 老年人。这种损害的严重程度可能有所不同，但仅限于 极少数情况下，它可以通过使用现有的 假肢装置。减轻这种损害的努力一直是 受阻于这一事实，既不是准确的特征，也不是 年轻人的完整过程，也不是其崩溃的原因 老的，目前都很好理解。 拟议的研究代表了旨在 调查老年人和年轻人是否有能力 在非最佳收听条件下理解语音，即， 语音目标与同时进行的语音目标的感知分离 不相关的“噪音”。这项研究有两个主要目的：(1) 在年长的和年轻的听众中，调查感性的 进程(特别是空间分辨率和时间分辨率 波动)，这些波动在分离的同时起作用 呈现相关和不相关的听觉信号；以及(2)研究 一组老年人在五年的时间里，为了 检测分离能力的初始或渐进性恶化 并确定这两个信号的相关性 恶化。 这些目标将通过测试选定的老年人群体来实现 以及接受标准和非标准听力测试的年轻人 以及心理物理测试。将对空间听力进行评估 在模拟的自由场中。多维听觉表现 受试者的概况将通过主成分定义 分析和其他多变量统计方法。 这项拟议研究的主要科学意义在于它 将提供对听觉时间和时间的更精确定义 允许语音感知分离的空间过程 和背景噪音，并将识别精确的听觉过程 受衰老的影响。这项研究的临床意义在于它 将建立一个多维的听觉能力数据库 轻度至中度感音神经性听力的老年人 损失，并可以识别听觉过程，如果受损，将 帮助预测在以下情况下语音理解能力即将恶化 非最佳收听条件。这项工作将对 老年人广泛存在的言语交流障碍。

DESCRIPTION: (Adapted From The Applicant's Abstract.) Impairment of the ability to understand conversation under difficult listening conditions, such as in highly reverberant rooms or in gatherings where several persons are talking simultaneously, affects a substantial portion of elderly individuals. This impairment may vary in severity, but only in very few cases can it be overcome by the use of currently available prosthetic devices. Attempts to alleviate this impairment have been impeded by the fact that neither the precise characteristics of the intact process in the young, nor the causes of its breakdown in the old, are currently well understood. The proposed research represents a continuation of work aimed at investigating the ability of both elderly and young individuals to understand speech under non-optimal listening conditions, i.e., perceptual separation of a speech target from simultaneously ongoing irrelevant "noise". The research has two main objectives: (1) to investigate, in elderly and in young listeners, the perceptual processes (in particular, spatial resolution and resolution of temporal fluctuations) which play a role in the separation of simultaneously presented relevant and irrelevant auditory signals; and (2) to study a group of elderly individuals over a five year period, in order to detect initial or progressive deterioration of the ability to separate simultaneous signals and to determine the correlates of this deterioration. These objectives will be achieved by testing selected groups of elderly and young individuals on standard and non-standard audiological tests as well as psychophysical tests. Spatial hearing will be assessed in a simulated free field. Multidimensional auditory performance profiles of subjects will be defined through principal component analysis and other multivariate statistical methods. The major scientific significance of the proposed study is that it will provide a more precise definition of auditory temporal and spatial processes that allow for the perceptual separation of speech and background noise and will also identify precise auditory processes affected by aging. The clinical significance of the study is that it will establish a multidimensional data base of auditory capabilities in elderly individuals with mild to moderate sensorineural hearing loss, and may identify auditory processes which, if impaired, will help predict impending deterioration of speech understanding under non-optimal listening conditions. This work will have an impact on a wide-spread impairment of verbal communication in the elderly.