We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
Classroom Acoustics for Enhancing Students' Understanding When a Teacher Suffers From a Dysphonic Voice.
- Authors
Bottalico, Pasquale; Murgia, Silvia; Mekus, Taylor; Flaherty, Mary
- Abstract
Purpose: The purpose of this project is to assess the acoustical conditions in which optimal intelligibility and low listening difficulty can be achieved in real classrooms for elementary students, taking into consideration the effects of dysphonic voice and typical classroom noise. Method: Speech intelligibility tests were performed in six elementary classrooms with 80 normal-hearing students aged 7-11 years. The speech material was produced by a female actor using a normal voice quality and simulating a dysphonic voice. The stimuli were played by a Head and Torso Simulator. Child babble noise and classrooms with different reverberation times were used to obtain a Speech Transmission Index (STI) range from 0.2 to 0.7, corresponding to the categories bad, poor, fair, and good. Results: The results showed a statistically significant decrease in intelligibility when the speaker was dysphonic, in STI higher than 0.33. The rating of listening difficulty showed a significantly greater difficulty in perceiving the dysphonic voice. In addition, younger children showed poorer performance and greater listening difficulty compared with older children when listening to the normal voice quality. Both groups were equally impacted when the voice was dysphonic. Conclusions: The results suggested that better acoustic conditions are needed for children to reach a good level of intelligibility and to reduce listening difficulty if the teacher is suffering from voice problems. This was true for children regardless of grade level, highlighting the importance of ensuring more favorable acoustic conditions for children throughout all elementary schools. Supplemental Material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23504487
- Subjects
SCHOOL environment; SPEECH perception; PHYSIOLOGICAL aspects of speech; INTELLIGIBILITY of speech; HUMAN voice; SPEECH audiometry; SIMULATION methods in education; TEACHERS; DESCRIPTIVE statistics; RESEARCH funding; SOUND; STUDENT attitudes; LISTENING; STATISTICAL sampling; VOICE disorders
- Publication
Language, Speech & Hearing Services in Schools, 2023, Vol 54, Issue 4, p1195
- ISSN
0161-1461
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1044/2023_LSHSS-22-00158