Patent ID: 8856001

Claim:
A speech sound detection apparatus comprising: a sound reception unit for receiving an input audio signal, an input power computation unit performing an input power computation operation for computing at every frequency input power that indicates a magnitude of sound represented by an audio signal, based upon the audio signal received by the sound reception unit, a correction function estimation unit performing a correction function estimation operation for estimating a correction function that is a continuous function defining a relation between a certain frequency and a correction coefficient used to approximate the computed input power at that frequency to the reference power predetermined for that frequency, an input power correcting unit performing input power correction operation of multiplying the computed input power by the correction coefficient obtained in accordance with the relation defined by the estimated correction function, for correcting the input power at every frequency, and a speech sound detection unit performing a speech sound detection operation for determining whether or not the sound represented by the received audio signal is speech sound, based upon the corrected input power, wherein the correction function estimation unit is adapted to estimate the correction function according to which the sum of all the values resulting from squaring the difference between the corrected input power and the reference power over a predetermined frequency range is minimal.