Orientadora: Suely Master / Banca: Alexandre Luiz Mate / Banca: Thomas Willlian Helesgrove / Resumo: Por intermédio desta pesquisa pretende-se apresentar e fazer refletir, a partir dos resultados obtidos por meio de um processo pedagógico desenvolvido com estudantes do curso de Licenciatura em Arte - Teatro do Instituto de Artes da UNESP. O objetivo da reflexão e pesquisa desenvolvidas nessa pesquisa consiste em estudar a relação entre a estimulação das habilidades do processamento auditivo e a percepção auditiva da própria fala. Sendo assim, buscou-se verificar, ao estimularmos as habilidades do processamento auditivo e de processos correlatos, se modificamos a percepção auditiva a respeito dos recursos expressivos utilizados durante a gravação de uma leitura dramática, realizada por cinco estudantes de Teatro. Para complementar o conjunto de dados a serem analisados, incluímos as respostas de um questionário, a respeito do comportamento auditivo e de seus correlatos, aplicado no início e reaplicado seis meses após o término da pesquisa. Também contamos com informações relacionadas à elaboração da proposta expressiva para a leitura dramática. Os resultados indicaram uma pluralidade de respostas entre as (os) estudantes, o que nos permitiu refletir a respeito do processo pedagógico de cada uma (um), a partir de diversas relações comparativas. Apesar das (os) estudantes terem mobilizado para a leitura dramática diversos recursos expressivos relacionados à emoção e à intenção, poucas (os) os reconheceram auditivamente na gravação feita no início do processo. A partir de resultados, foi possível relacionar o proposto para a leitura dramática com o que foi percebido nas duas análises perceptivo-auditivas feitas pelas (os) estudantes, uma no início e outra no final da pesquisa. De modo que nos permitiu inferir conclusões propositivas, dentre as quais, destacamos o reconhecimento do quanto integrar a ... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: The present research aims to present and reflect from the results obtained through a pedagogical process developed with students of Arts and Drama degree of the Arts Institute of UNESP. The goal of the study consists of the relation between the hearing process abilities stimulation and the auditory perception of the own speech. This way, it will be verified if as long as the hearing process abilities and related processes are stimulated the auditory perception is modified concerning the significant resources used during a dramatic reading recording made by five drama students. In order to complement the data set to be analyzed, survey answers about the hearing behavior and related ones were included and applied at the beginning of the research and other ones six months after the end of the research as well as information related to significant proposal elaboration to a dramatic reading. The students were analyzed individually and the results indicated the plurality of answers among them which allowed us to reflect on the pedagogical process of each one from several comparative relations. Although the students have proposed to the dramatic reading many significant resources related to their emotion and to their intention, only few recognized, aurally, during the recording made at the beginning of this research. Based on results like this one, it was possible to relate what was proposed to the dramatic reading to what was understood in both auditory perceptive analysis made at the beginning and at the end of the research by the students. So, it allowed us to infer proposal conclusions which we would like to emphasize the recognition of how much we integrate the action of making oral sounds to the action of feeling something could be relevant to actresses and actors in order to make them more aware of increasing the consistence of auditory ... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Mestre

A fim de avaliar a confiabilidade de alguns dos testes que avaliam o Processamento Auditivo (PA), foi realizado um estudo do tipo teste-reteste desta avaliação, em um intervalo de uma semana e um mês entre as duas situações. O desempenho de 40 indivíduos foi analisado em relação à situação de teste e reteste, normalidade versus alteração e orelha testada. Verificou-se que os testes do PA, utilizados neste estudo, demonstraram sua confiabilidade por meio do teste-reteste / In order to verify the reliability of some Auditory Processing (AP) tests was carried out a test-retest study in a break of a week and a month between the two situations. The performance of 40 individuals was analyzed regarding the situation (test-retest), normality versus alteration and tested ear. It was confirmed that the AP tests used in this study indicated their reliability through the test-retest

Orientador: Jônatas Manzolli / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Artes / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-23T23:42:49Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Penha_BernardoAguiardeSouza_M.pdf: 2677028 bytes, checksum: 429276465186071bdb6c17d7dbad5831 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013 / Resumo: A interação de um indivíduo com os estímulos sonoros que o cercam é um estudo relevante, o qual dialoga com a pesquisa contemporânea sobre Cognição Musical. Esta dissertação foca esse campo temático a partir do estudo da percepção sonora, mais especificamente da noção de Antecipação vinculada ao aporte teórico da Psicologia da Expectativa, fundamentada por David Huron [2]. A partir desse recorte, desenvolvemos um estudo teórico e experimental sobre a relação entre Familiaridade [42] e Expectativa [2]. No nosso estudo os sujeitos foram submetidos à audição de estímulos/amostras sonoras apresentadas simultaneamente a um ruído mascarante. Nosso intuito foi verificar de que maneira a Expectativa sonora age no processo de escuta de sons com espectro sonoro complexo. Partimos do pressuposto de que há uma relação de proporção direta, ou seja, quanto mais familiar é um som, melhor o antecipamos. Para medir essa relação, utilizamos dois parâmetros psicoacústicos: loudness e tempo de resposta por ação reflexa. De acordo com nossa hipótese experimental, esperávamos que o quão mais familiar fosse o som, menores seriam o loudness e o tempo necessário para que houvesse uma resposta reflexa do indivíduo ao estímulo. Assim, a Familiaridade acarretaria uma melhor acuidade perceptiva e, como consequência, haveria uma melhora significativa na Antecipação. Após realizar um experimento piloto e um estudo final, obtivemos dados que, por análise estatística, forneceram suporte para confirmar a hipótese / Abstract: The interaction of an individual with sound stimuli that surround him is a relevant study, which dialogues with the contemporary research on Musical Cognition. This dissertation focuses this subject field as from the study of sound perception, specifically the notion of Anticipation linked to the theory of the Psychology of Expectation, supported by David Huron (2006). From this point of view, we developed a theoretical and experimental study on the relationship between Familiarity (Yonelinas, 2002) and Expectation (Huron, 2006). In our study the subjects underwent hearing sound stimuli/samples presented simultaneously with a masking noise. Our objective was to verify in which manner the sound Expectation would behave in the process of listening to sounds with complex sound spectrum. We assumed that there is a relationship of direct proportion, i. e., the more familiar a sound is, the better we anticipate it. In order to measure this relationship, we used two psychoacoustic parameters: loudness and response time by reflex action. According to our experimental hypothesis, we expected that the more familiar the sound was, the smaller the loudness and time needed to cause a reflex response of the individual to the stimulus should be. Thus, the Familiarity would entail a better perceptual accuracy, and consequently, there would be a significant improvement in the Anticipation. After conducting a pilot experiment and a final study, we obtained data, which with the necessary statistical analysis provided support to confirm the hypothesis / Mestrado / Fundamentos Teoricos / Mestre em Música

Orientador: Maria Francisca Colella dos Santos / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-18T22:28:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Galeti_MarinaBelloni_M.pdf: 2685853 bytes, checksum: 1ede18d7bd0816078bdbce67cce595fe (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011 / Resumo: Introdução: Para o adequado desenvolvimento das habilidades de leitura e escrita, é necessário a integridade do sistema nervoso, atenção seletiva e sustentada, discriminação auditiva, memória de curto e longo prazo e consciência fonológica, que podem ser avaliadas no conjunto de testes do processamento auditivo (PA). Tem sido sugerido que a função do sistema olivocolear medial pode ser avaliado por meio da supressão das emissões otoacústicas transientes (EOATs). A função desse sistema tem sido estudada em crianças com distúrbio do PA devido à sua suposta ação na melhora da discriminação auditiva e inteligibilidade de fala em ambientes ruidosos. Objetivo: Analisar o processamento auditivo e o efeito de supressão das EOATs em crianças com dislexia. Além disso, analisar o efeito de um programa de remediação fonológica, de leitura e escrita no PA. Material e Método: Os sujeitos foram divididos em três grupos: GE1: 23 crianças com dislexia; GE2: 15 crianças do GE1 foram reavaliadas após serem submetidas à remediação fonológica, de leitura e escrita; GC: 28 crianças de escola pública, sem queixas auditivas e escolares. Foram realizados os procedimentos: anamnese, avaliação audiológica básica, avaliação do PA e supressão das EOAs. Resultados: As crianças com dislexia apresentaram desempenho estatisticamente inferior ao do GC nos testes: memória sequencial não verbal (MSNV), teste dicótico de dígitos (TDD), teste de padrão de duração (TPD), teste de padrão de frequência (TPF), e gaps in noise (GIN) - orelha esquerda. O GE1 não apresentou supressão das EOAs. Não houve correlação entre os testes de PA e os valores de supressão das EOATs em nenhum grupo avaliado. As crianças do GE2 apresentaram melhora estatisticamente significante no desempenho nos testes TDD, TPD, TPD e GIN pós remediação. Apenas os meninos apresentaram supressão das EOAs na etapa pós remediação. Conclusão: As crianças com dislexia deste estudo apresentaram alteração nos testes de PA, principalmente na habilidade auditiva de ordenação temporal. A remediação fonológica, de leitura e escrita, foi capaz de melhorar as habilidades auditivas das crianças com dislexia deste estudo / Abstract: Introduction: For an adequate development of learning and writing abilities it is necessary the nervous system integrity, selective and sustained attention, auditory discrimination, short and long term memories and phonological awareness, which can be evaluated through auditory processing (AP) tests. It has been suggested that the function of the medial olivocochlear system can be evaluated by the suppression effect of the transient otoacoustic emission (TOAE). This system's function has been studied in children with disorder of AP because of its supposed actions on the improvement of auditory discrimination and speech intelligibility in noisy environments. Aim: Analyze the auditory processing and the suppression effect of transient otoacoustic emission (TOAE) in children with dyslexia, and analyze the effect of phonological, reading and writing remediation program in the AP. Material and Method: Children were divided in three groups: GE1: 23 dyslexia children; GE2: 15 children of GE1 were evaluated again after phonological, reading and writing remediation program; GC: 28 children of public school, without hearing or learning disabilities. Procedures were performed: anamnesis, basic audiologic evaluation, AP tests and suppression of OEA. Results: Children with dyslexia presented performance statistically inferior than GC in nonverbal sequential memory test (NSMT), dichotic digit test (DDT), pitch and duration pattern sequence test (PPS and DPS) and gaps in noise (GIN) - left hear. GE1 didn't present suppression of OAE. There wasn't correlation between the AP tests and the supression of OEA in any of the evaluated groups. The children of GE2 presented improvement statistically significant in performance in: DDT, PPS, DPS and GIN after remediation program. Only boys presented suppression of OEA in pos testing. Conclusion: Children with dyslexia from this study presented alteration in AP tests, mainly in auditory ability of temporal ordering. Phonological, reading and writing remediation were able to improve the auditory abilities of children with dyslexia from this study / Mestrado / Saude da Criança e do Adolescente / Mestre em Saude da Criança e do Adolescente

Orientador: Maria Francisca Colella dos Santos / Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-26T11:07:43Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Amaral_MariaIsabelRamosdo_D.pdf: 1629865 bytes, checksum: d52167401c1c74b5a29a03df219a4c3a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014 / Resumo: O distúrbio do processamento auditivo pode apresentar-se de forma isolada ou em comorbidade com alterações do desenvolvimento e/ou quadros neurológicos, como a Epilepsia Benigna da Infância com Espículas Centrotemporais (EBICT). Objetivo: analisar as habilidades do processamento auditivo e consciência fonológica em escolares com EBICT. Tipo do estudo: corte transversal comparativo prospectivo. Material e Método: o grupo estudo (GI) foi composto por 13 crianças com diagnóstico de EBICT e grupo controle (GII) por 17 crianças sem epilepsia, queixas auditivas e/ou escolares. Após avaliação neurológica e audiológica, foram aplicados os testes auditivos Dicótico de Dígitos, Dicótico Consoante-Vogal, Gaps-in-Noise, Padrão de Duração e a Prova de Consciência Fonológica (PCF). O desempenho foi comparado entre os grupos e verificou-se a correlação entre os testes auditivos e PCF. Resultados: GI apresentou desempenho estatisticamente inferior (p<0.001) ao GII nas tarefas de resolução temporal e ordenação temporal. Houve pior desempenho estatístico na habilidade de figura-fundo para sons linguísticos nas orelhas direita (p=0.026) e esquerda (p=0.025) em relação ao GII. O GI apresentou pior desempenho nas tarefas da prova silábica (p=0.001), fonêmica(p=0.006), rima (p=0.015) e aliteração (p=0.010). Houve correlação positiva significante entre as habilidades de ordenação temporal e figura-fundo para sons linguísticos (integração binaural) e a PCF no GI (p<0.001). Conclusão: crianças com Epilepsia Benigna da Infância com Espículas Centrotemporais apresentam desempenho alterado em tarefas envolvendo as habilidades auditivas de figura-fundo para sons verbais por meio do mecanismo de integração binaural, ordenação e resolução temporal e de consciência fonológica. Foi possível observar correlação entre o processamento auditivo e a consciência fonológica na amostra estudada / Abstract: Introduction: Disorders involving perceptual processing of auditory information by the central auditory nervous system (CANS) may present itself isolated or co-morbid with developmental disorders and/or neurological conditions, such as benign epilepsy of childhood with centro-temporal spikes (BECTS). Aim: analyze auditory processing and phonological awareness in school-age children with BECTS. Study design:comparative cross-sectional prospective study. Methods: Patient Group (GI) consisted of 13 children diagnosed with BECTS. Control group (GII) consisted of 17 health children. After neurological and peripheral audiological assessment, children underwent a behavioral auditory evaluation and Phonological Awareness Assessment and the procedures applied were: Dichotic Digits test (DD), Dichotic Consoant-Vowel Test (DCV), Gaps-in-Noise Test (GIN), Duration Pattern test and Phonological Awareness Test (PCF). Results were compared between groups and a correlation analysis was performed between temporal tasks and phonological awareness performance. Results: GII performed significantly better than the children with BECTS (GI) in both GIN and Duration Pattern test (p<0.001). GI showed worst performance on dichotic listening on right ear (p=0.026) and left ear (p=0.025), when compared to GI. GI performed significantly worse in all of the 4 categories of phonological awareness assessed: syllabic (p=0.001), phonemic (p=0.006), rhyme (p=0.015) and alliteration(p=0.010). Conclusion: children with BECTS may have difficulties in binaural integration, temporal resolution, temporal ordering and phonological awareness skills. A correlation was observed between auditory processing and phonological awareness in the studied sample / Doutorado / Saude da Criança e do Adolescente / Doutora em Ciências

Orientadora: Ana Claudia Vieira Cardoso / Co-orientadora: Simone Aparecida Capellini / Banca: Ana Cláudia Figueiredo Frizzo / Banca: Fabíola Ferrer Del Nero Mecca / Resumo: A investigação do transtorno do processamento auditivo central em escolares tem sido objeto de estudo de muitos pesquisadores, visto que alterações nas habilidades auditivas têm impacto em nossas atividades cotidianas, em especial no que se refere a comunicação e, é de fundamental importância para o sucesso acadêmico. Frequentemente, esse transtorno coexiste com distúrbios de linguagem, aprendizagem e outros. Sendo assim é de fundamental importância investigar a relação entre estas patologias. O objetivo deste estudo foi descrever e comparar o desempenho de crianças com diagnóstico de transtorno de aprendizagem e dislexia nos testes comportamentais do processamento auditivo central e, de forma complementar, descrever os escores do questionário Scale of Auditory Behavior e verificar o grau de concordância entre o questionário e a avaliação do processamento auditivo central desta população. Trata-se de um estudo analítico e retrospectivo realizado por meio da análise dos prontuários eletrônicos da Instituição SORRI, cidade de Bauru - SP, no período de 2014 a 2016. A amostra foi então constituída por 60 crianças, de ambos os gêneros, com idade entre 9 e 12 anos, subdivididas em dois grupos: grupo I (GI): composto por 30 crianças com diagnóstico de Transtorno de Aprendizagem e; grupo II (GII): composto por 30 crianças com diagnóstico de dislexia. Analisaram-se as informações referentes ao questionário Scale of Auditory Behaviors e à avaliação Comportamental do Processamento Audit... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: Many researchers have studied central auditory processing disorder in schoolchildren, since changes in auditory abilities have an impact on our daily activities, especially those related to communication, and are fundamental to academic success. Often, this disorder coexists with language, learning and other disorders. Therefore, it is of fundamental importance to investigate the relationship between these pathologies. The aim of this study was to describe and compare the performance of children diagnosed with learning disorder and dyslexia in behavioral tests of central auditory processing, to describe the scores of the Scale of Auditory Behavior, and to verify the degree of agreement between this questionnaire and central auditory processing evaluation in this population. This is an analytical and retrospective study accomplished by analyzes of electronic medical records of the SORRI Institution, Bauru - SP, from 2014 to 2016. The sample was composed of 60 children of both genders, aged between 9 and 12 years, subdivided into two groups: group I (GI): composed of 30 children with a diagnosis of learning disorder and; Group II (GII): composed of 30 children with a diagnosis of dyslexia. It was analyzed information's about Scale of Auditory Behaviors questionnaire and the behavioral evaluation of central auditory processing. On the behavioral evaluation were applied following tests: Speech in Noise, Pediatric Speech Intelligibility (PSI), Staggered Spondaic Word (SSW), Randon... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Mestre

Background: In developing the PB-50 word lists, J. P. Egan suggested five developmental principles, two of which were "equal average difficulty" and an "equal range of difficulty" among the lists (page 963). Egan was satisfied that each of the 20 PB-50 lists had equivalent ranges of recognition performances and that the lists produced the same average performances. This was accomplished in preliminary studies that measured the recognition performance of each word and eliminated words that were always or never correct. In preparing for studies of interrupted words, we needed to know the range of difficulty inherent in the speaker specific NU-6 and Maryland CNC materials we planned to use when those words were not interrupted. There were only a few studies in the literature that touched on the range of difficulty characteristic of the word-recognition materials in common usage. The paucity of this information prompted this investigation whose scope broadened to include the CID W-22, Maryland CNC, NU-6, and PB-50 materials spoken by a variety of speakers. Purpose: The purpose was to evaluate the homogeneity with respect to intelligibility of the words that comprise several of the common word-recognition materials used in audiologic evaluations. Research Design: Both retrospective (10) and prospective (3) studies were involved. Data from six of the retrospective studies were from our labs. The prospective studies involved both listeners with normal hearing for pure tones and listeners with sensorineural hearing loss. Study Sample: The sample sizes for the 13 data sets ranged from 24 to 1,030, with 24 the typical number for listeners with normal hearing. Data Collection and Analysis: The retrospective data were from published studies and archived data from our laboratories. The prospective studies involved presentation of the word-recognition materials to the listeners at a comfortable level. An item analysis was conducted on each data set with descriptive statistics used to characterize the data. Additionally, skewness coefficients were calculated on the distributions of word performances and the interquartile range was used to determine minor and major outliers within each set of 200 words and their component 50-word lists (300 words for the Maryland CNCs). Results: For listeners with normal hearing the majority of performances on the words within a 50-word list were better than the mean performance, which produced negatively skewed distributions with outlier performances in every list. For listeners with sensorineural hearing loss the performances on the words within a 50-word list were evenly distributed above and below the mean performance, which yielded essentially normal distributions with few outliers. There were a few words on which performances were better by the listeners with hearing loss. Conclusions: Every list of word-recognition materials has a few words on which recognition performances are noticeably poorer than performances on the majority of the remaining words. If the intention of an experiment is to evaluate performance at the word level, then identifying these "outliers" becomes a necessity. Although not evaluated in this report, the implications for 25-word lists are they should be based on recognition-performance data and not compiled arbitrarily.

Background: The abrupt transition of a signal from off to on and vice versa typically produces spectral splatter that can mask other signals that are spectrally removed from the nominal signal frequency. Both the Miller and Licklider (1950) and Cherry (1953) studies of interrupted speech and alternated speech, respectively, acknowledged the generation of extraneous noise by the rapid on and off characteristics of their unshaped signals but noted for slower interruption rates (e.g., 10 interruptions per second); the masking effects were minimal. Recent studies of interrupted speech have avoided this issue by shaping the rise-fall times with a digital algorithm (e.g., Jin and Nelson, 2010; Wang and Humes, 2010). A second variable in the interrupted speech paradigm is the temporal location or placement of the interruptions (i.e., where in the waveform the interruptions occur). Here the issue is this: what parts of an utterance are necessary to enable intelligibility (e.g., Fogerty and Kewley-Port, 2009)? Interruptions may or may not disturb these necessary cues. Purpose: Here is the prompting question: do shaped and unshaped rise-fall characteristics of the on-segments of interrupted speech produce the same or different recognition performances? A second question arises: are recognition performances on complementary halves of an interrupted signal the same or different? Research Design: This study used a mixed-model design with two within-subject variables (unshaped and shaped rise-fall characteristic, complementary halves) and one between-subjects variable (listener group). Study Sample: A total of 12 young listeners (age range: 19-29 yr) with normal hearing and 12 older listeners (age range: 53-80 yr) with hearing loss for pure tones participated. Data Collection and Analysis: A total of 95 consonant-vowel nucleus-consonant words were interrupted (10 interruptions per second; 50% duty cycle) by parsing alternate 50 msec segments to separate files, which provided complementary temporal halves of the target word referenced to word onset; the first on-segment of the 0 msec condition started at word onset, whereas the first on-segment of the 50 msec condition started 50 msec after word onset. The interruption routine either applied no shaping of the 4 msec rise-fall times or a cos2 shape. Each listener received 25 practice words then a unique randomization of 280 interrupted words (70 words, 2 rise-fall shapes, and 2 interrupt onset conditions). Results: The listeners with normal hearing performed 8-16% better on the various comparable conditions than did the older listeners with hearing loss. The mean performance differences between shaped and unshaped rise-fall characteristics ranged from <1-3% and were not significant. Performance was significantly 10-17% better on the 0 msec condition than on the 50 msec condition. There was no significant interaction between the two main variables, rise-fall shape, and onset time of the interruptions. Conclusions: The rise-fall shape of the onset and offset of the on-segment of the interruption cycle does not affect recognition performance of words. The location of the interruptions in a word can have a significant effect on recognition performance.

Background: The Revised Speech Perception in Noise Test (R-SPIN; Bilger, 1984b) is composed of 200 target words distributed as the last words in 200 low-predictability (LP) and 200 high-predictability (HP) sentences. Four list pairs, each consisting of two 50-sentence lists, were constructed with the target word in a LP and HP sentence. Traditionally the R-SPIN is presented at a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR, S/N) of 8 dB with the listener task to repeat the last word in the sentence. Purpose: The purpose was to determine the practicality of altering the R-SPIN format from a single SNR paradigm into a multiple SNR paradigm from which the 50% points for the HP and LP sentences can be calculated. Research Design: Three repeated measures experiments were conducted. Study Sample: Forty listeners with normal hearing and 184 older listeners with pure-tone hearing loss participated in the sequence of experiments. Data Collection and Analysis: The R-SPIN sentences were edited digitally (1) to maintain the temporal relation between the sentences and babble, (2) to establish the SNRs, and (3) to mix the speech and noise signals to obtain SNRs between -1 and 23 dB. All materials were recorded on CD and were presented through an earphone with the responses recorded and analyzed at the token level. For reference purposes the Words-in-Noise Test (WIN) was included in the first experiment. Results: In Experiment 1, recognition performances by listeners with normal hearing were better than performances by listeners with hearing loss. For both groups, performances on the HP materials were better than performances on the LP materials. Performances on the LP materials and on the WIN were similar. Performances at 8 dB S/N were the same with the traditional fixed level presentation and the descending presentation level paradigms. The results from Experiment 2 demonstrated that the four list pairs of R-SPIN materials produced good first approximation psychometric functions over the -4 to 23 dB S/N range, but there were irregularities. The data from Experiment 2 were used in Experiment 3 to guide the selection of the words to be used at the various SNRs that would provide homogeneous performances at each SNR and would produce systematic psychometric functions. In Experiment 3, the 50% points were in good agreement for the LP and HP conditions within both groups of listeners. The psychometric functions for List Pairs 1 and 2, 3 and 4, and 5 and 6 had similar characteristics and maintained reasonable separations between the HP and LP functions, whereas the HP and LP functions for List Pair 7 and 8 bisected one another at the lower SNRs. Conclusions: This study indicates that the R-SPIN can be configured into a multiple SNR paradigm. A more in-depth study with the R-SPIN materials is needed to develop lists that are systematic and reasonably equivalent for use on listeners with hearing loss. The approach should be based on the psychometric characteristics of the 200 HP and 200 LP sentences with the current R-SPIN lists discarded. Of importance is maintaining the synchrony between the sentences and their accompanying babble.

Background: The Words-in-Noise Test (WIN) was developed as an instrument to quantify the ability of listeners to understand monosyllabic words in background noise using multitalker babble (Wilson, 2003). The 50% point, which is calculated with the Spearman-Kärber equation (Finney, 1952), is used as the evaluative metric with the WIN materials. Initially, the WIN was designed as a 70-word instrument that presented ten unique words at each of seven signal-to-noise ratios from 24 to 0 dB in 4 dB decrements. Subsequently, the 70-word list was parsed into two 35-word lists that achieved equivalent recognition performances (Wilson and Burks, 2005). This report involves the development of a third list (WIN List 3) that was developed to serve as a practice list to familiarize the participant with listening to words presented in background babble. Purpose: To determine - on young listeners with normal hearing and on older listeners with sensorineural hearing loss - the psychometric properties of the WIN List 3 materials. Research Design: A quasi-experimental, repeated-measures design was used. Study Sample: Twenty-four young adult listeners (M=21.6 yr)with normal pure-tone thresholds (≤20 dB HL at 250 to 8000 Hz) and 24 older listeners (M=65.9 yr) with sensorineural hearing loss participated. Data Collection and Analysis: The level of the babble was fixed at 80 dB SPL with the level of the words varied from 104 to 80 dB SPL in 4 dB decrements. Results: For listeners with normal hearing, the 50% points for Lists 1 and 2 were similar (4.3 and 5.1 dB S/N, respectively), both of which were lower than the 50% point for List 3 (7.4 dB S/N). A similar relation was observed with the listeners with hearing loss, 50% points for Lists 1 and 2 of 12.2 and 12.4 dB S/N, respectively, compared to 15.8 dB S/N for List 3. The differences between Lists 1 and 2 and List 3 were significant. The relations among the psychometric functions and the relations among the individual data both reflected these differences. Conclusions: The significantz3 dB difference between performances on WIN Lists 1 and 2 and on WIN List 3 by the listeners with normal hearing and the listeners with hearing loss dictates caution with the use of List 3. The use of WIN List 3 should be reserved for ancillary purposes in which equivalent recognition performances are not required, for example, as a practice list or a stand alone measure.