Speech Communication with Flat-Attenuation Hearing Protectors

摘要

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of flat attenuationhearing protective devices (HPDs) in a simulated work environment and develop a HPD oriented speech communication measure to assess speech communication effectiveness between HPD wearers. Five potential measures of speech communication were compared to determine their usefulness for assessing communication efficiency with HPDs. Flat attenuation HPDs were evaluated in noisy environments. Speech communication in noise was assessed for HPD wearers with high frequency sersorineural hearing loss. Results indicated that HPDs negatively affected speech communication in noise under the conditions of the study. Noise attenuation and speech communication did not significantly differ among the earplugs compared in this study when all the earplugs were inserted using the informed user fitting protocol. Both speech perception and speech production were affected by HPDs. The Simulated Battleship Game protocol used, was found to have the potential to be developed into a standardized test for assessing speech communication under various listening conditions.