Children's Recall of Words Spoken in Their First and Second Language: Effects of Signal-to-Noise Ratio and Reverberation Time

Anders Hurtig; Marijke Keus van de Poll; Elina P Pekkola; Staffan Hygge; Robert Ljung; Patrik Sörqvist

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.02029

Children's Recall of Words Spoken in Their First and Second Language: Effects of Signal-to-Noise Ratio and Reverberation Time

Front Psychol. 2016 Jan 14:6:2029. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.02029. eCollection 2015.

Authors

Anders Hurtig¹, Marijke Keus van de Poll², Elina P Pekkola², Staffan Hygge², Robert Ljung², Patrik Sörqvist³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Building, Energy and Environmental Engineering, University of GävleGävle, Sweden; Linnaeus Centre HEAD, Swedish Institute for Disability Research, University of LinköpingLinköping, Sweden; Department of Education, Health and Social Studies, University of DalarnaFalun, Sweden.
² Department of Building, Energy and Environmental Engineering, University of Gävle Gävle, Sweden.
³ Department of Building, Energy and Environmental Engineering, University of GävleGävle, Sweden; Linnaeus Centre HEAD, Swedish Institute for Disability Research, University of LinköpingLinköping, Sweden.

Abstract

Speech perception runs smoothly and automatically when there is silence in the background, but when the speech signal is degraded by background noise or by reverberation, effortful cognitive processing is needed to compensate for the signal distortion. Previous research has typically investigated the effects of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and reverberation time in isolation, whilst few have looked at their interaction. In this study, we probed how reverberation time and SNR influence recall of words presented in participants' first- (L1) and second-language (L2). A total of 72 children (10 years old) participated in this study. The to-be-recalled wordlists were played back with two different reverberation times (0.3 and 1.2 s) crossed with two different SNRs (+3 dBA and +12 dBA). Children recalled fewer words when the spoken words were presented in L2 in comparison with recall of spoken words presented in L1. Words that were presented with a high SNR (+12 dBA) improved recall compared to a low SNR (+3 dBA). Reverberation time interacted with SNR to the effect that at +12 dB the shorter reverberation time improved recall, but at +3 dB it impaired recall. The effects of the physical sound variables (SNR and reverberation time) did not interact with language.

Keywords: children; classroom acoustics; reverberation time; second-language; signal-to-noise ratio; speech perception.