bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Speech intelligibility and listening effort in every-day listening situations
Authors: Holube Inga , von Gablenz Petra , Kissner Sven , Bitzer Joerg
Published: June 2017

Noise and reverberation affect speech intelligibility and increase listening effort. The impact is more severe for hearing-impaired listeners than for normal-hearing listeners and might lead to less social interactions, and reduced quality of life. While lab experiments are well controlled to get reliable outcomes, every-day listening situations are far more complex. Obtaining objective data of acoustical characteristics outside a laboratory is difficult, given the required equipment and its proper handling as well as privacy concerns emerging from audio recordings in a non-regulated and populated environment. Therefore, we developed a privacy-aware smartphone-based system that allows for long-term ecological momentary assessment. This system combines descriptions of the environment and subjective ratings on predefined scales with objective features derived from the acoustical signal. In a field study, forty-seven elderly listeners used the system for about four consecutive days. Results show that the listeners spend most of their time in environments with quite high signal-to-noise ratios resulting in high speech intelligibility ratings and low listening effort. More demanding situations are comparatively rare and include restaurant or car environments. The presentation summarizes the study results and discusses their contribution to further developments of today’s lab experiments towards more natural listening settings.
Speech reception in fluctuating noise: Which is the benefit?
Authors: Prodi Nicola , Visentin Chiara
Published: June 2017

Speech intelligibility in a fluctuating noise is widely acknowledged to be higher than in a stationary noise with the same long-term level, as listeners take advantage of the information in the masker dips. Anyway, it is demonstrated in a companion paper (On the relationship between a short-term objective metric and listening efficiency data for different noise types, Proc. of Acoustics’17) that when the two noises are described with a short-term metric, able to properly follow their run-time course, the same intelligibility is found in both maskers. In fluctuating (ICRA) noise the accuracy result is reached involving a greater amount of cognitive resources and the background noise is perceived as more effortful. In this study the same methodology, based on the joint assessment of accuracy results and cognitive load, is applied in two real life scenarios (a canteen and a café), where speech reception is impaired by diffuse, non- informative, fluctuating maskers. Impulse responses and noise samples were collected in the environments and rendered in a silent laboratory room; listening tests were presented to a panel of normal-hearing young adults. The results in real environments are compared with simulations in the same listening conditions, with ICRA noise as a masker.
Face the music: Classical music students and the sound of performance
Authors: Dance Stephen
Published: June 2017

Since the implementation and enforcement of the European Union Physical Agents Directive (Noise) the Acoustics Group has collaborated with the Royal Academy of Music creating the noise team formed from administrators, scientists, and senior management. Our challenge was to allow these highly talented artists to practice, rehearse, and perform safely during their time at the Royal Academy of Music. This ten year project involved more than 3000 musicians measuring sound exposure of each instrument group and the hearing acuity of every student, as well as hearing surveillance of a sample of graduates. At each occurrence, the students were questioned as to their aural environment. The paper will focus upon the hearing acuity of undergraduates after studying music for a period of four years.
Nonlinear behavior of different sized granular bead media on a vibrating clamped circular elastic plate
Authors: Haas Claire E. , Korman Murray S.
Published: June 2017

This experiment uses a soil plate oscillator (SPO), or a circular acrylic (elastic) plate clamped into place using flanges, to study the nonlinear oscillatory behavior of a column of granular media (with selected diameters) that is supported by the plate. Secured on the underside of the plate's center is a rare earth magnet that is driven by an AC coil which is controlled by an amplified swept sinusoidal chirp. An accelerometer is fastened to the magnet and a spectrum analyzer measures the plate's acceleration versus frequency. In separate measurements of nonlinear tuning curve response, the plate is loaded with 350 grams of spherical soda lime beads of diameters 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 10 mm. The driver current is changed in 40 evenly spaced increments, holding other parameters fixed, during each sweep. A study of the backbone curve (rms acceleration a(f) peak versus frequency f) for each bead diameter exhibits a frequency “softening” vs. amplitude—similar to the nonlinear mesoscopic elasticity observed in resonance experiments in geo-materials. After some initial curvature, the plot has a negative linear slope with increasing amplitude. Smaller beads show significantly more acceleration response than larger beads while the slopes have somewhat comparable values.
Numerical and experimental investigation of the role of inertia on acoustic Rayleigh streaming in a standing waveguide
Authors: Baltean-Carlès Diana , Daru Virginie , Weisman Catherine , Bailliet Hélène , Reyt Ida
Published: June 2017

Rayleigh streaming is a mean flow generated by the interaction between a standing wave and a solid wall. In the case of a low amplitude wave inside a cylindrical resonator, the streaming pattern along a quarter wavelength is composed of two toroidal cells: An inner cell close to the tube wall and an outer cell in the core. In the present work the effect of inertia on Rayleigh streaming at high acoustic level is investigated numerically and experimentally. To this effect, time evolutions of streaming cells in the near wall region and in the resonator core are analyzed. For the analysis of the outer cell, an analogy with the lid-driven cavity in a cylindrical geometry is proposed. It is shown that the outer cell is distorted due to convection, but the previously observed emergence of an extra cell cannot be recovered. Inertial effects on the established streaming flow pattern are further investigated numerically by solving time averaged Navier-Stokes equations with an imposed acoustic source. Results are similar to those obtained from the lid-driven cavity simulations. Therefore inertial effects cannot be considered as responsible for the mutation of streaming at high acoustic levels.
Simulating the energy cascade of shock wave formation process in a resonator by gas-kinetic scheme
Authors: Zhang Xiaoqing , Qu Chengwu , Feng Heying
Published: June 2017

The temporal-spatial evolution of the sound field in a cylindrical resonator driven by a piston was simulated by gas-kinetic scheme (GKS), and periodic shock waves propagating back and forth were observed in the resonator with finite displacement amplitude of the driving piston. It can been seen from the instantaneous spatial distribution of the oscillatory pressure and velocity in the resonator that the oscillatory pressure is a one-dimensional,but the oscillatory velocity exhibits a quasi-one-dimensional distribution due to the effect of the boundary layer.The evolution process of shock wave from the sinusoidal wave to the zigzag wave was demonstrated with the increasing of the driving displacement amplitude of the piston. Especially, simulation results revealed that the acoustic intensity was linearly proportional to the driving displacement amplitude of the piston, rather than the square type. The studied results demonstrated well the process of harmonic energy cascade by the FFT analysis, at the same time, the physical explanations has been also given. The simulation results of acoustic intensity were well consistent with the existing experimental results, which verifies the validity of GKS modeling method.
Analysis of different modeling approaches of the cochlea impedance in FE models of the human middle ear
Authors: Lobato Lucas C. , Paul Stephan , Cordioli Julio A.
Published: June 2017

Finite element models of the human middle ear are important tools in the development of implantable hearing aids or to study the impact of surgeries on middle ear dynamics. Thus, the cochlea impedance seen by the middle ear is a very important parameter when modeling the middle ear dynamic behavior. The cochlea impedance can be seen as the load effect provide by cochlea fluid over the stapes footplate. Although several papers describe human middle ear FE models, there is no consensus about how to better include the cochlea impedance at FE model. In this work, a review of the different modeling approaches found in the literature is presented. Each approach was implemented, and the results for the middle ear frequency response (stapes velocity versus tympanic membrane pressure) were compared. The results are also compared with experimental data for the middle ear frequency response. An alternative model is also proposed that includes measured data for the cochlea impedance. From the results, it was observed significantly difference between methods in frequencies above 900 [Hz]. It was concluded that using the experimental data, it is added more damping at high frequencies.
Objective psychoacoustics
Authors: Gatt Monika , Guettler Marcus , Marburg Steffen
Published: June 2017

An intuitive psychological understanding of sound is given by nature. Being aware of the meaning of sound often requires an identifying process of an ethical and physical explanation (propter hoc and post hoc). For an objective, scientific and ethical result, one has to investigate sound in the frames of psychoacoustic parameters. But objective psychoacoustics has to fulfill psychological criteria, discuss aesthetic evaluation as well as reflect physical sources. The tension arises between the subjective listeners, whose decisions of participation in the test are based on free will, and the researchers in acoustics, whose experiment setup is orientated to achieve independent results. Both parties are driven by empirical and metaphysical pragmatism and the awareness of the difference between subjectivity and objectivity. The discussion is held with respect to the gender, profession, age (childhood and elderly people) and nationality. With this information, the question arises how to get from an individual point of view to an overall perspective. For this purpose, the chair of Vibroacoustics of Vehicles and Machines of the Technical University of Munich is in the process of developing an open source psychoacoustic toolbox. The results will be analyzed in a systematic and objective method.
On the existence of sex, menstrual-cycle, and race differences in psychoacoustical performance
Authors: McFadden Dennis , Pasanen Edward G. , Maloney Mindy M. , Leshikar Erin M. , Pho Michelle H.
Published: June 2017

Performance was measured on several common psychoacoustical tasks for about 70 subjects. Subjects were tested in same-sex crews of 4—8 members. Testing required 8—10 weeks for each crew to assure that all subjects were well practiced on all tasks. Of initial interest were any differences by sex and by menstrual cycle. Correlation and effect size were the primary measures of interest. Resampling was used to determine implied significance for the various comparisons studied. During analysis, racial background turned out to be a relevant variable; because this was unexpected, recruitment by, and documentation of, race was poor, so the best we could do was categorize subjects as Non-White or White. For essentially all of the psychoacoustical tasks measured, the sex and menstrual differences were non-significant when the results were pooled across race. However, when the subjects were partitioned by race, small-to-moderate sex and menstrual differences did emerge, primarily for the White subjects. Correlations between certain behavioral tasks were moderately high, and this also varied somewhat by race. Past studies reporting sex or menstrual differences likely consisted primarily of White subjects. Multiple lines of evidence suggest that these race differences are attributable to the intracochlear concentration of melanin.
The perception of musical consonance beyond the traditional existence region of pitch
Authors: Carcagno Samuele , Lakhani Saday , Plack Christopher J.
Published: June 2017

The traditional notion that pitch perception breaks down for frequency components above 5 kHz was challenged by a study [Oxenham et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 108, 7629-7634 (2011)] showing that complex tones high-pass filtered at 6 kHz convey the perception of melodic intervals. We investigated whether complex tones high-pass filtered above 6 kHz can also convey the perception of harmonic intervals. Eleven listeners rated the pleasantness of consonant and dissonant dyads (two-note chords) consisting of harmonic complex tones band-pass filtered either in a low-frequency (1-6 kHz) or in a high-frequency (7-12 kHz) region. The two tones in each dyad were presented to opposite ears. In the high-frequency condition the dyads were presented with a low-pass noise to mask combination tones. Pleasantness ratings were significantly higher for consonant than for dissonant intervals in both frequency regions. This preference for consonant dyads in the high-frequency region was not observed when the tones were made inharmonic by shifting all their components by a fixed offset so as to preserve envelope periodicity cues. The results indicate that the perception of consonance is preserved for tones composed entirely of components above the traditional existence region of pitch.
Amplitude envelope reconstruction based on signal periodicity
Authors: Dellwo Volker , Kathiresan Thayabaran , He Lei
Published: June 2017

Speech can be modeled as the sum of high frequency carrier signals (temporal fine structure; TFS) from different frequency bands modulated in amplitude by a low frequency modulator (amplitude envelope; ENV). Previous research revealed that ENV cues alone can be sufficient for speech intelligibility. The present research tested the role of signal periodicity to reconstruct ENV information. Signal periodicity was measured by harmonics-to-noise ratio (HNR) with HNR = 10*log10(signal/noise) in 60 msec windows at 10 msec steps in each of 6 frequency bands (Greenwood spacing) of different speech signals (bw = 8 kHz). Resulting HNR contours were correlated with respective ENVs in each frequency band and high correlations (r>0.8) could be obtained. This was also true when ENV was removed in each band (multiplying the signal with the inverse Hilbert ENV) prior to processing of the HNR contour. HNR contours were used to amplitude modulate noise (noise vocoding). The HNR vocoded speech revealed to be equally intelligible as ENV vocoded speech. Results give rise to the view that speech periodicity—which is extremely robust towards linear system distortions—might lend itself for recovering ENV cues in the auditory processing of speech.
On the capabilities of the psychoacoustic Matlab toolbox ASAPP in comparison with commercial algorithms
Authors: Scholz Magdalena , Gatt Monika , Guettler Marcus , Marburg Steffen
Published: June 2017

Vibrating surfaces generate sound. Every moving part of a vehicle or a device can create sound. This sound influences the user’s perception of this device. Hence, sound design is increasingly prevailing. An analysis of sound with regard to its perception, i.e., to psychoacoustic parameters, is not only needed for the optimization of the user’s experience, but also to analyze systems. An experienced mechanic can detect a defect in a vehicle by listening to its sound, which is hardly executable by merely analyzing the frequency spectrum and the sound pressure level. Therefore, the authors use psychometric parameters to emulate the analysis done by the mechanic in the previous example. For such kind of analysis, the open source Matlab toolbox ASAPP—Audio Signal Analysis and Psychoacoustic Parameter was developed. To evaluate the capabilities of ASAPP, the authors compare results from the toolbox with results obtained from commercial software by means of analyzing different sound samples. In addition, different models for the psychoacoustic parameters are compared with respect to the type of signals investigated.
Normative data for assessing performance on a rapid, automated test of speech-on-speech masking and spatial release from masking
Authors: Gallun Frederick J. , Jakien Kasey , Srinivasan Nirmal , Seitz Aaron , Kampel Sean , Stansell Meghan
Published: June 2017

The ability to understand speech in the presence of competing sound sources is essential to communication success. This task is difficult for listeners with healthy auditory systems, but becomes substantially more difficult as listeners age and experience various insults to the system. Our laboratory has developed a rapid, automated method of measuring the relative ability to perform a standard laboratory version of this task, which has been applied to a large set of spatial separations between 0 and 135 degrees, and a range of levels and bandwidths. Performance has been obtained in over 100 listeners varying in age and hearing ability between one and fifteen times over the course of four years. We have examined both the reliability of this test, by comparing how performance changed across test sessions with the same acoustical conditions (less than 1 dB on average), and the relative influences of age and hearing loss at various separations. Normative functions based on over 100 listeners are available for a colocated control condition, a spatial separation of 45 degrees, and the difference between the two (spatial release from masking). Normative functions take into account both age, between 18 and 80 years, and moderate hearing loss in the standard audiometric frequencies. A calibrated version of the test is freely available for use on an iPad.
Better-ear glimpsing for fully and partially degraded speech signals
Authors: Goupell Matthew , Stakhovskaya Olga , Bernstein Joshua G. , Brungart Douglas
Published: June 2017

Normal-hearing listeners seem to take advantage of “better-ear glimpsing” when a target signal is masked by interfering sounds with different fluctuations in the two ears, presumably by analyzing small spectro-temporal bins and synthesizing the bins from the ear with the best signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). This study investigated the glimpsing mechanism using degraded inputs associated with bilateral cochlear implants (BICIs). BICI and NH listeners identified three-digit sequences spoken by a target talker at 0° with interfering talkers that were co-located at 0° or placed at ±60°. Glimpsing was evaluated by comparing the co-located control condition with either a standard bilateral condition (where the better-ear glimpses alternated across the ears) or a better-ear processed condition (where all the better-ear glimpses were artificially moved to one ear). Both NH and BICI listeners obtained substantial spatial benefit in the better-ear processed condition. However, the spatial benefit in the standard bilateral condition was greatly reduced for the BICI listeners and for NH listeners listening to vocoded signals. Varying the number of vocoder channels from 4 to 128 had little effect on the spatial release. The results provide insights into the cues listeners use to extract speech from fluctuating maskers. [Work supported by NIH R01-DC014948 (Goupell).]
Comparison of the component-wise and projection-based Padé approximant methods for acoustic coupled problems
Authors: Rumpler Romain , Göransson Peter
Published: June 2017

Several Padé-based computational methods have been recently combined with the finite element method for the efficient solution of complex time-harmonic acoustic problems. Among these, the component-wise approach, which focuses on the fast-frequency sweep of individual degrees of freedom in the problem, is an alternative to the projection-based approaches. While the former approach allows for piecewise analytical expressions of the solution for targeted degrees of freedom, the projection-based approaches may offer a wider range of convergence. In this work, the two approaches are compared for a range of problems varying in complexity, size and physics. This includes for instance the modeling of coupled problems with non-trivial frequency dependence such as for the modeling of sound absorbing porous materials. Conclusions will be drawn in terms of computational time, accuracy, memory allocation, implementation, and suitability of the methods for specific problems of interest.
A general substructuring synthesis method for the analysis of complex vibro-acoustic interaction systems
Authors: Zhang Zhenguo , Meaud Julien
Published: June 2017

A general substructuring synthesis method is proposed for analyzing structural-acoustic interaction problems in engineering applications. The approach is performed by systematically partitioning the entire system into a series of distinct components according to geometries and boundaries. The motion of substructures and fluid subdomains is then discretized and represented by the classical Rayleigh-Ritz method, while the perturbed Lagrangian method is employed to connect the disjoint substructures and subdomains by imposing approximate compatibility conditions. The established framework enables one to easily model the interior acoustics of combined fluid structural systems with geometric complexities and to effectively analyze vibro-acoustic behaviors with sufficient accuracy at relatively high frequencies. Several numerical examples are carried out to demonstrate the reliability and applicability of the present method, which illustrate a significant computational advantage as compared to classical Finite Element procedures.
Characteristic amplitude-frequency functions of the radiated sound power
Authors: Klaerner Matthias , Wuehrl Mario , Kroll Lothar , Marburg Steffen
Published: June 2017

The simulation-based design of dynamically loaded and acoustically sensitive components essentially includes the determination of the radiated sound power. Regarding several simplifications different approaches based on the surface velocity can be applied, e.g. the equivalent radiated sound power (ERP). The required frequency steps of steady state dynamic simulations are determined using efficient modal super imposed models. For single modes of rectangular plates, universal amplitude-frequency functions shall be identified. Considering the damping ratio of the mode, only one resonant frequency step is further needed for the estimation of the radiated sound power in the whole given frequency range. Computationally expensive steady state simulations thus are significantly reduced.
Wavelet-decomposed Rayleigh-Ritz method for plate transverse vibration simulations in high frequency regime
Authors: Zhang Su , Cheng Li
Published: June 2017

This paper focus on the extraordinary ability of the wavelet decomposition for plate transverse vibration analyses under the framework of Rayleigh-Ritz method. Using a normalized rectangular plate as an example, 2-d Daubechies wavelet scale functions are used as admissible functions for decomposing the flexural displacement of the plate, along with the artificial springs at the boundary, to predict vibration of the plate in an extremely large frequency range with any boundary conditions. Numerical results of eigenvalues on F-F-F-F, C-C-C-C and S-S-S-S are given, in excellent agreement with predictions of classical methods. t is shown that the use of wavelet basis allows reaching very high frequencies, typically covering nearly 15000 modes within 1% error using conventional computational facility. The frequency response under S-S-S-S case is also validated. The strategy for choosing parameters of admissible functions is also investigated. Due to the vanishing moment, compactly supported and orthogonal properties, 2-D Daubechies wavelet scale functions exhibit appealing features which allow global expansion in dealing with various vibration problems.
Lexical influences on error patterns of adult listeners in competing speech perception
Authors: Jesse Alexandra , Helfer Karen S.
Published: June 2017

When listening to a talker while a second talker is audible, lexical characteristics of words in both speech streams influence the accuracy of word recognition. We examined how lexical properties influence the types of errors listeners make. In a competing speech task, younger, middle-aged, and older adults heard keywords placed in pairs of low-close probability sentence frames. Word frequency and neighborhood density of key words in both streams were systematically varied. As expected, susceptibility to the masker increased across the adult lifespan, indicated by an increase in errors phonologically related to the masker. The probability of masker-related errors increased in all listener groups when targets came from dense neighborhoods or when maskers came from sparse neighborhoods. Younger and middle-aged adults made more errors that were phonologically influenced by the masker or jointly by masker and target when targets were low-frequency rather than high-frequency words. Younger adults were also more likely to respond with the actual masker word. In contrast, older adults made more masker-related errors when hearing high-frequency rather than low-frequency masker words. Lexical properties of words in target and masker streams therefore influence the types of errors listeners make in competing speech situations. [Work supported by NIDCD R01 DC012057.]
Oral-facial kinematics and configuration drive asymmetries in visual vowel perception
Authors: Masapollo Matthew , Polka Linda , Ménard Lucie , Morgan James , Tiede Mark
Published: June 2017

Masapollo, Polka, and Ménard (2016) have recently reported that adults show robust directional asymmetries in unimodal visual-only vowel discrimination: a change from a relatively less to a relatively more peripheral vowel (in F1-F2 articulatory vowel space) results in significantly better performance than a change in the reverse direction. In the present experiments, we examined the nature of the information that is critical to elicit these asymmetries. Toward this end, we created schematic analogues that retained the isolated kinematics (spatial direction and motion) and/or configuration (global shape) of the lips of Masapollo et al.’s model speaker. We found that subjects showed asymmetries while discriminating dynamicpoint-light displays that specified both the kinematics and configuration of the speaker’s lips (Experiment 1). Moreover, this directional effect was not dependent on subjects’ knowledge that the point-light stimuli were based on distal articulatory movements (Experiment 2). In contrast, no asymmetries emerged during the discrimination of abstract figure-eight shapes that depicted labial kinematic cues, but not labial configuration (Experiment 3). We interpret these findings as evidence that information for both lip shape and lip motion drive asymmetries in visual vowel perception and discuss the results in relation to general and specialized processes in speech perception.
Talker identification is not improved by lexical access in the absence of familiar phonology
Authors: McLaughlin Deirdre E. , Cheng Cecilia C. , Thurston Emily J. , Dougherty Sara C. , Perrachione Tyler K.
Published: June 2017

Listeners identify talkers more accurately when they are familiar with both the sounds and words of the language being spoken. It is unknown whether lexical information alone can facilitate talker identification in the absence of familiar phonology. To dissociate the roles of familiar words and phonology, we developed Mandarin-English “hybrid” sentences, spoken in Mandarin, which can be convincingly coerced to sound like English when presented with corresponding subtitles (e.g., “wei4 gou3 chi1 kao3 li2 zhi1” becomes “we go to college”). Across two experiments, listeners learned to identify talkers in three conditions: listeners' native language (English), an unfamiliar, foreign language (Mandarin), and a foreign language paired with subtitles that primed native language lexical access (subtitled Mandarin). In Experiment 1 listeners underwent a single session of talker identity training; in Experiment 2 listeners completed three days of training. Talkers in a foreign language were identified no better when native language lexical representations were primed (subtitled Mandarin) than when foreign-language speech was presented, regardless of whether listeners had received one or three days of talker identity training. These results suggest that the facilitatory effect of lexical access on talker identification depends on the availability of familiar phonological forms.
Effects of intelligibility on within- and cross-modal sentence recognition memory
Authors: Keerstock Sandie , Smiljanic Rajka
Published: June 2017

Listener-oriented speaking style adaptations improve sentence recognition memory in quiet and in noise (Van Engen et al. 2012, Gilbert et al. 2014). It is not clear if this advantage arises from the available cognitive resources, or enhanced memory traces. The present study investigated what may underlie the improved recognition memory for clear speech. In the within-modal condition, monolingual English listeners heard a total of 40 unique meaningful sentences in conversational and clear speaking styles, followed by a test phase in which they identified 80 audio sentences as old or new. In the cross-modal condition, the acoustic input in the test phase was replaced by written text. Results showed that while accuracy was high in both conditions, conversational-to-clear speech modifications significantly improved sentence recognition memory only in the within-modal condition. In the cross-modal condition, speaking style had no effect on sentence recognition memory. The results suggest that the benefit of clear speech over conversational speech on recognition memory lies in exaggerated acoustic-phonetic cues whose presence is necessary to activate memory traces. Speaking style adaptations may promote the encoding and storing of lower-level acoustic information rather than higher-level semantic information.
The social requirements of speech perception distract drivers, not cell phones
Authors: McGowan Kevin B. , Nielsen Jamison
Published: June 2017

Talking on a cellphone impairs driving. This is true regardless of whether the cellphone is held (Strayer & Johnston 2001) or hands-free (Strayer et al. ) (cf. Fitch et al. (2013)). Distraction seems to arise from split attention between the cognitive needs of driving and of listening to speech. Importantly, however, listening to the radio or podcasts is not distracting (Strayer et al. 2015). Perhaps the resolution to this apparent contradiction lies in the integration of social and linguistic knowledge during perception (e.g. Sumner et al. 2013). We hypothesize that listeners performing a task in a social listening situation may prioritize stimuli that are available to their interlocutor. We recorded listeners’ responses in a between-subjects go/no-go task under a non-social control (podcast) condition and in both non-shared and shared experimental conditions. Participants in the non-shared condition listened to a story told by a live interlocutor seated in a nearby soundbooth. In the shared condition, listeners were aware that their screen was visible to this interlocutor. Data collection is still underway, but early results suggest that listeners in the shared-screen condition do indeed show less apparent impairment than listeners in the non-shared condition. This result is consistent with Sumner et al’s model of social speech perception and suggests that distracted driving is a question of speech perception.
Talker identification in three types of background noise
Authors: Razak Alina , Thurston Emily J. , Gustainis Lauren E. , Kidd Gerald , Swaminathan Jayaganesh , Perrachione Tyler K.
Published: June 2017

Perceiving speech under informational masking requires listeners to distinguish and attend to one talker from among competing talkers. However, it is unknown how well listeners are even able to identify a target talker in the presence of noise, much less how this ability is affected by factors such as noise type, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), and speech content. In a two-day training paradigm, young adults with normal hearing learned to identify five talkers by the sound of their voice in quiet. We then tested talker identification accuracy during masking by speech-shaped noise, multi-talker babble, and a single, unfamiliar competing talker. Test stimuli contained both trained and novel sentences and were presented at three different SNRs. Talker identification was highest in quiet and fell as a function of SNR for all noise types. The change in accuracy as a function of SNR was greatest for multi-talker babble. Across all noise types and SNRs, talkers were identified more accurately from trained sentences than untrained ones. There was substantial individual variability in talker identification accuracy in noise, which appeared unrelated to listeners’ pure-tone hearing levels, speech perception in noise, phonological awareness, or phonological memory, even after controlling for talker identification accuracy in quiet.
Does lexicality or phonemic predictability affect cross-modal identification of bisyallabic items?
Authors: Sanchez Kauyumari , Lachs Lorin , Carlon Alexis , LaShell Patrick
Published: June 2017

Although people can match visual-only speech to auditory-only speech (and vice-versa) when the sources match under a variety of conditions (e.g. Lachs & Pisoni, 2004; Sanchez, Dias, & Rosenblum, 2013), it is unclear to what extent this ability is mediated by abstract, cognitive processes, representations, and linguistic experience (Vitevitch & Luce, 1999; Sánchez-García, Enns, & Soto-Faraco, 2013). To address this question, the current experiment replicates and extends Vitevitch & Luce (1999) by including audio and visual stimuli presentations of bisyallabic words and non-words that vary on phonemic predictability. In the cross-modal AB matching task, participants were presented with either visual-only speech (e.g. a talker’s speaking face) or auditory speech (a talker’s voice) in the A position. Stimuli in the B position consisted of the opposing sensory modality, counterbalanced. A significant Phonetic Probability X Presentation Order interaction was found. People perform similarly well on high and low probability words when the presentation order is A-V, but perform worse on V-A orders differently. For V-A, people perform better than expected on low probability items compared to high probability items. These results mirror previous results obtained by Sanchez, Marshall, & Lachs (2015) cross-modal matching in different languages.
Priming effects of Tone 51 Sandhi in Taiwan Southern Min
Authors: Chen Mao-Hsu
Published: June 2017

Tone sandhi refers to the alternation between base and sandhi tones. In Taiwan Southern Min (TSM), a word generally changes from its base tone to the corresponding sandhi tone when it occurs in non-final positions of a syntactically determined constituent. Tone sandhi of the five unchecked tones in TSM realizes itself in a quasi-circular chain shift, the phonological opacity of which poses a theoretical challenge for both the rule-based generative framework and the output-based grammar like OT. To probe into the representation of such allotonic variation, sandhi T51 → T55 was used in an auditory-auditory priming lexical decision experiment to examine priming effects between monosyllabic real-morpheme primes and their corresponding disyllabic targets including I) T55TX, underlyingly T51TX, and II) T51e33 as adjectives, a special case where T51 remains its base tone. Each target was preceded by either a T55 prime (surface-tone match for type I target and allotone match for type II), a T51 prime (underlying-tone match for both types), or a TX unrelated control prime, where X is a tone other than 55 and 51. Results showed an overall stronger facilitation effect for T51 primes than for T55 primes, indicating the significance of underlying-tone match in auditory processing.
Objective acoustic shadow detection with phase-measuring sidescan sonars
Authors: de Moustier Christian
Published: June 2017

Interpretation of seafloor acoustic images obtained with sidescan sonars is readily improved by applying conventional radiometric corrections that compensate for known fixed gains, for spreading and absorption losses, and for the effective instantaneous area ensonified by the transmitted pulse within the sonar beam. This area is a function of the angle of incidence on the bottom, which is obtained by ray-tracing from the angle of arrival of the echo relative to vertical estimated at receiver pairs in phase-measuring sidescan sonar systems equipped with inertial motion sensors. A further improvement in the acoustic imagery is achieved by estimating the in-situ roll-plane beam pattern of the sonar using all pings in a survey, then applying the resulting normalized beam pattern function to echoes from each ping at their respective attitudes. Thus effects of the sonar system and the environment are removed while preserving the physical characteristics of the seafloor acoustic backscattering process. Then, acoustic shadows can be objectively defined below a specific threshold in the signal-to-noise ratio computed from the sample complex cross-correlation coefficient function between receivers in each pair. A single shadow threshold value applies to all the data from an entire survey, with potential benefits to automatic target recognition algorithms.
Synthetic aperture sonar contrast prediction and estimation
Authors: Cook Daniel , Brown Daniel
Published: June 2017

Sidescan imaging sonar performance is often described using metrics such as resolution, maximum range, and area coverage rate. These attributes alone cannot completely characterize image quality. Shadow regions often carry as much, and sometimes even more, information than the direct return from a target. The shadow contrast ratio is an important metric of image quality, and it includes contributions from the sonar hardware, the environment, and the signal processing. This presentation provides an overview of a comprehensive quantitative model for predicting the contrast ratio. This analysis of image quality has significant implications for system design, mission planning, and data processing. Key design and processing tradeoffs are highlighted using design parameters typical for high-frequency synthetic aperture sonar applications.
Sonar imaging in extremely shallow inshore environments from an unmanned surface vehicle
Authors: Hunter Alan J. , Rymansaib Zuhayr , Metcalfe Benjamin W. , Wilson Peter R.
Published: June 2017

Sonar imaging systems and autonomous platforms are becoming smaller and more affordable. Consequently, their applications are expanding further into the civilian domain. A good example and the focus of this work is an autonomous survey system for aiding police dive teams during underwater crime scene investigations. In this paper, we describe our ultra portable and low-cost unmanned surface vehicle (USV) currently under development for the London Metropolitan Police Service. In particular, we concentrate on the challenges associated with operating the USV's sonar payloads in the extremely shallow waters associated with relevant operational scenarios; these include, canals, lakes, and reservoirs with water depths commonly in the range of only 0.5 m to 3 m. In these cases, a key challenge is the corrupting influence of multipath reflections between the floor and water surfaces. We have taken a pragmatic approach to this multipath problem that uses in-situ assessment of the sonar performance for optimal data acquisition and interpretation. Results are presented from experimental trials conducted in operational canal environments.
Creation of a corpus of realistic urban sound scenes with controlled acoustic properties
Authors: Gloaguen Jean-Rémy , Can Arnaud , Lagrange Mathieu , Petiot Jean-François
Published: June 2017

Sound source detection and recognition using acoustic sensors are increasingly used to monitor and analyze the urban environment as they enhance soundscape characterization and facilitate the comparison between simulated and measured noise maps using methods such as Artificial Neural Networks or Non-negative Matrix Factorization. However, the community lacks corpuses of sound scenes whose acoustic properties of each source present within the scene are precisely known. In this study, a set of 40 sound scenes typical of urban sound mixtures is created in three steps: (i) real sound scenes are listened and annotated in terms of events type, (ii) artificial sound scenes are created based on the concatenation of recorded individual sounds, whose intensity and duration are controlled to build scenes that are as close as possible to the real ones, (iii) a test is carried out to validate the level of their perceptual realism of those crafted scenes. The interest of using such corpus is then demonstrated using an important task in urban environment description: the estimation of the traffic level in urban acoustic scenes.
Role of carrier signal types in perception of Thai phonemes: Implications for cochlear implant recipients
Authors: Saimai Nantaporn , Tantibundhit Charturong , Onsuwan Chutamanee
Published: June 2017

It is well known that segmental (consonants and vowels) and suprasegmental (e.g., tone and stress) speech sounds provide intrinsically different kinds of perceptual information. These differences suggest that phoneme perception might be improved in cochlear implant strategy by employing a carrier signal that is most compatible to each type of speech sounds. However, all speech vocoder strategies for cochlear implant (CI) available in most of works use one carrier signal due to their simplicity to implement. In this paper, we investigated the role of five different carrier signals for Thai speech perception on different types of phonemes, i.e., sine-carrier with/without band-pass filter (TF/TNF), noise-carrier with/without band-pass filter (NF/NNF), and temporal fine structure carrier (TFS). Each type of carrier signal was used to synthesize speech stimuli using the continuous interleaved sampling (CIS) strategy as basic and commonly used for CI. Four different psychoacoustic tests for initials, finals, vowels were performed on 20 Thai normal hearing (NH) listeners, while 13 NH listeners were used for lexical tones. Experimental results showed that sine-carriers provided the highest intelligibility scores for initials, finals, and vowels, while NNF provided the highest intelligibility scores for lexical tones. The results suggested that the way to provide an optimal speech perception for tonal language is to use two parallel carriers in speech vocoder strategy for CI.
Long-range correlations of microseism-band pressure fluctuations in the ocean
Authors: Ball Justin S. , Godin Oleg A. , Evers Läslo , Lv Cheng
Published: June 2017

We investigate the spatial coherence of underwater infrasonic noise using a yearlong time series measured by hydrophones moored off Ascension Island. Qualitative agreement with observed cross-correlations is achieved using a simple range-dependent model, constrained by earlier, active tomographic studies in the area. In particular, the model correctly predicts the existence of two weakly dispersive normal modes in the microseism frequency range, with the group speed of one of the normal modes being smaller than the sound speed in water. The agreement justifies our interpretation of the peaks of the measured cross-correlation function of ambient noise as modal arrivals, with dispersion that is sensitive to crustal velocity structure. Our observations are consistent with Scholte to Moho head wave coupled propagation, with double mode conversion occurring due to the bathymetric variations between receivers. We thus demonstrate the feasibility of interrogating crustal properties using noise interferometry of moored hydrophone data at ranges in excess of 120 km.
Estimating rates of coherent leakage from a variety of ocean surface duct types
Authors: Jones Adrian D. , Duncan Alec J. , Zhang Zhi Yong
Published: June 2017

In prior work, we obtained a semi-empirical algorithm for the rate of leakage from a mixed layer surface duct with linear sound speed gradients both within and below the duct. Realistic surface ducts are, however, likely to include zones of nonlinear sound speed gradient. In this paper, we made an initial test of whether the leakage rate is strongly dependent on the shape of the sound speed profile or whether it may be adequately approximated based on consideration of the trapping frequency alone. We used a normal mode model to obtain the rate of leakage for each of several nonlinear surface ducts for which the sound speed profiles can be expressed analytically. In each case, the leakage has been compared with that for a duct with a linear gradient, obtained using the algorithm above. In this comparison, the different ducts have been designed so that they all have the same trapping frequency, the same gradient at the top of the respective profiles, and the same sound speed gradient below the duct.
Extension of the array invariant to deep-water environments
Authors: Cho Chomgun , Song Hee-Chun , Thode Aaron
Published: June 2017

The array invariant utilizes multiple arrivals separated in beam angle and travel time for broadband signals, achieving robust source-range estimation without detailed knowledge of the environments in shallow water. This approach includes the waveguide invariant parameter β, which is close to one for surface/bottom-interacting shallow-water environments. In deep water, however, β significantly varies from large negative to positive values depending on the group of modes, while being sensitive to the sound speed variation within the water column. In this paper, two different approaches are investigated: 1) an extension of the array invariant by integrating multiple arrivals with varying β and 2) the use of dispersion relationship between several pairs of arrivals. These two approaches will be applied to a deep-water environment (4-km deep) using a 13-m aperture vertical array deployed to the sound channel axis (e.g., 330-m) from the Medium Frequency Noise experiment (MFN), where a high-frequency source (above 1 kHz) also was positioned around the sound channel axis.
Efficacy of Paromomycin-Chloroquine Combination Therapy in Experimental Cutaneous Leishmaniasis
Authors: Wijnant Gert-Jan , Van Bocxlaer Katrien , Yardley Vanessa , Murdan Sudaxshina , Croft Simon L.
Published: June 2017

The 4-aminoquinoline chloroquine (CQ) is clinically used in combination with doxycycline to cure chronic Q fever, as it enhances the activity of the antibiotic against the causative bacterium
Coxiella burnetii
residing within macrophage phagolysosomes. As there is a similar cellular host-pathogen biology for
Leishmania
parasites, this study aimed to determine whether such an approach could also be the basis for a new, improved treatment for cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL). We have evaluated the
in vitro
and
in vivo
activities of combinations of CQ with the standard drugs paromomycin (PM), miltefosine, and amphotericin B against
Leishmania major
and
Leishmania mexicana
. In 72-h intracellular antileishmanial assays, outcomes were variable for different drugs. Significantly, the addition of 10 μM CQ to PM reduced 50% effective concentrations (EC
50
s) by over 5-fold against
L. major
and against normally insensitive
L. mexicana
parasites. In murine models of
L. major
and
L. mexicana
CL, daily coadministration of 50 mg/kg of body weight PM and 25 mg/kg CQ for 10 days resulted in a significant reduction in lesion size but not in parasite load compared to those for mice given the same doses of PM alone. Overall, our data indicate that PM-CQ combination therapy is unlikely to be a potential candidate for further preclinical development.