Effect of the relationship between target and masker sex on infants' recognition of speech

When faced with multiple people speaking simultaneously, adult listeners use the sex of the talkers as a cue for separating competing streams of speech. As a result, adult listeners show better performance when a target and a background voice differ from one another in sex. Recent research suggests...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published inThe Journal of the Acoustical Society of America Vol. 141; no. 2; pp. EL164 - EL169
Main Authors Newman, Rochelle S., Morini, Giovanna
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States 01.02.2017
Subjects
Acoustic Stimulation
Age Factors
Audiometry, Speech
Child, Preschool
Cues
Female
Humans
Infant
Infant Behavior
Male
Noise - adverse effects
Perceptual Masking
Recognition (Psychology)
Sex Factors
Speech Perception
Voice Quality
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:When faced with multiple people speaking simultaneously, adult listeners use the sex of the talkers as a cue for separating competing streams of speech. As a result, adult listeners show better performance when a target and a background voice differ from one another in sex. Recent research suggests that infants under 1 year do not show this advantage. So when do infants begin to use talker-gender cues for stream segregation? These studies find that 16-month-olds do not show an advantage when the masker and target differ in sex. However, by 30 months, toddlers show the more adult-like pattern of performance.
ISSN:0001-4966
1520-8524
DOI:10.1121/1.4976498