Computer-based auditory skill building program for aural (re)habilitation

基于计算机的听觉技能培养计划，用于听力（康复）康复

• 批准号: 8249393
• 负责人: PAMELA ALLISON CONNORS
• 金额: $ 46.4万
• 依托单位: BIOSPEECH, INC.
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2008-09-05 至 2015-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/8249393
• 关键词: Adult; American; Auditory; Brain; Child; Client; Cochlear Implants; Computer software; Computers; Devices; Discrimination; Disease; Effectiveness; Environment; Evaluation; Exposure to; Geographic Locations; Goals; Habilitation; Health; Hearing; Hearing Aids; Home environment; Human; Image; Individual; Individual Differences; Insurance; Internet; Intervention; Language; Learning; Noise; Outcome; Perception; Performance; Phase; Prosthesis; Protocols documentation; Published Comment; Records; Research; Resource Sharing; Specialist; Speech; Speech Sound; Surveys; System; Testing; Training; United States; Visit; Vocabulary; Voice; autism spectrum disorder; base; clinical practice; computer program; computerized; cost; cost effective; hearing impairment; improved; phonology; programs; scaffold; skills; sound; specific language impairment; teacher

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): According to the MarkeTrak VII survey (Kochkin 2008), there are roughly 35 million individuals in the US with some degree of hearing loss. Of these, almost 10 million have hearing aids and 67,000 have cochlear implants. The goal of auditory (re)habilitation (AR) programs is to build the listening skills of individuals with hearing loss, so that they can comprehend the language in their environment. With appropriate hearing devices and AR, individuals with hearing loss can begin to discriminate and identify the speech sounds in the spoken language around them. In Phase I of this project we developed an adaptive computer-guided AR software program called the Sound Identification Tutor (SIT) that focused on sound identification and discrimination. For a video demonstration showcasing the SIT please visit http://www.biospeech.com/research/ar.html. The SIT provides an automated sequence of sound targets to be trained and it chooses the type of target depending on the performance of the user. It also chooses whether to present the target in auditory or audiovisual mode. The SIT uses natural human audiovisual recordings of all the word targets. It also uses child-friendly images of simple words to make this software suitable and fun for children. The results of an evaluation of the software with 24 children and adults showed that over a course of 10 sessions subjects significantly improved their sound identification skills. Children benefitted more from the automated lesson sequence than adults. Adults tended to prefer to choose their own sound targets to train on. In addition, we showed that subjects improved on specific sound targets they trained on, but problematic targets from the pre-test that were not trained on did not improve in the post-test. This showcases the fact that improvements were not caused by increased exposure to speech but by training specific sound targets. In this Phase II proposal, we will extend the SIT and develop it into a marketable product. The proposal consists of the following aims: (i) To Build a Spanish Version of the SIT; (ii) To Extend the SIT with Words Embedded in Sentences with Optional Background Noise and Multiple Speakers; (iii) To Extend the Open- Ended Training Module of the SIT; (iv) To Expand the SIT to Create a DVD installer, Interface with the Web, and Develop an In-home Login UI; (v) To Evaluate the Program Specifically for In-home Use; (vi) To Create a Built-in Assessment Protocol to Produce User-specific Listening Intervention Plans PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: In the United States, there are roughly 35 million individuals with some degree of hearing loss and of these, almost 10 million have hearing aids and 67,000 have cochlear implants who need intensive auditory (re)habilitation (AR) training to fully realize the potential benefit of their prostheses and attain intelligible speech. Face-to-face AR training with a specialist is expensive, not always covered by insurance and not always feasible because clients may not have access to a specialist, esp. if they speak a different language. The proposed project will expand upon an adaptive computer-guided software program (the Speech Identification Tutor, SIT) that focuses on learning phoneme discrimination and identification and will provide a Spanish version of the software, provide additional synthetic voices for open-ended training, provide an additional adaptive sentence task where individuals are exposed to words embedded in sentences, with background noise, and multiple speakers and will be evaluated for in-home use by a larger group of users.

描述（由申请人提供）：根据 MarkeTrak VII 调查（Kochkin 2008），美国大约有 3500 万人患有某种程度的听力损失。其中，近 1000 万人佩戴助听器，67,000 人佩戴人工耳蜗。听觉（康复）项目的目标是培养听力损失者的听力技能，以便他们能够理解周围环境中的语言。借助适当的听力设备和 AR，听力损失者可以开始辨别和识别周围口语中的语音。 在该项目的第一阶段，我们开发了一种自适应计算机引导 AR 软件程序，称为声音识别导师 (SIT)，专注于声音识别和辨别。有关 SIT 的视频演示，请访问 http://www.biospeech.com/research/ar.html。 SIT 提供了要训练的声音目标的自动序列，并根据用户的表现选择目标类型。它还选择是否以听觉或视听模式呈现目标。 SIT 使用所有单词目标的自然人类视听记录。它还使用儿童友好的图像和简单的文字，使该软件适合儿童并充满乐趣。对 24 名儿童和成人进行的软件评估结果表明，经过 10 次课程，受试者的声音识别技能得到了显着提高。与成人相比，儿童从自动化课程序列中受益更多。成年人往往更喜欢选择自己的声音目标进行训练。此外，我们还发现，受试者在接受训练的特定声音目标上有所改善，但预测试中未接受训练的有问题的目标在后测试中并没有改善。这表明了这样一个事实：进步不是由增加言语接触引起的，而是由训练特定的声音目标引起的。 在这个第二阶段提案中，我们将扩展SIT并将其开发成可销售的产品。该提案包括以下目标： (i) 建立西班牙语版本的 SIT； (ii) 通过在带有可选背景噪音和多个说话者的句子中嵌入单词来扩展 SIT； (iii) 扩展 SIT 的开放式培训模块； (iv) 扩展 SIT 以创建 DVD 安装程序、与 Web 的接口以及开发家庭登录 UI； (v) 评估专门用于家庭使用的程序； (vi) 创建内置评估协议以制定针对用户的听力干预计划 公共健康相关性：在美国，大约有 3500 万人患有某种程度的听力损失，其中近 1000 万人佩戴助听器，67,000 人植入人工耳蜗，他们需要强化听觉（康复）训练，以充分认识假肢的潜在益处并获得清晰的言语。与专家进行面对面的 AR 培训非常昂贵，而且并不总是包含在保险范围内，而且并不总是可行，因为客户可能无法接触到专家，尤其是在培训中。如果他们说不同的语言。拟议的项目将扩展一个自适应计算机引导软件程序（语音识别导师，SIT），该程序专注于学习音素辨别和识别，并将提供该软件的西班牙语版本，为开放式训练提供额外的合成语音，提供额外的自适应句子任务，其中个人暴露于句子中嵌入的单词、背景噪音和多个说话者，并将由更大的用户群体进行家庭使用评估。