The articulation index (AI), speech-transmission index (STI), and coherence-based intelligibility metrics have been evaluated primarily in steady-state noisy conditions and have not been tested extensively in fluctuating noise conditions. The aim of the present work is to evaluate the performance of new speech-based STI measures, modified coherence-based measures, and AI-based measures operating on short-term intervals in realistic noisy conditions. Much emphasis is placed on the design of new band-importance weighting functions which can be used in situations wherein speech is corrupted by fluctuating maskers. The proposed measures were evaluated with intelligibility scores obtained by normal-hearing listeners in 72 noisy conditions involving noise-suppressed speech (consonants and sentences) corrupted by four different maskers (car, babble, train, and street interferences). Of all the measures considered, the modified coherence-based measures and speech-based STI measures incorporating signal-specific band-importance functions yielded the highest correlations . The modified coherence measure, in particular, that only included vowel/consonant transitions and weak consonant information yielded the highest correlation with sentence recognition scores. The results from this study clearly suggest that the traditional AI and STI indices could benefit from the use of the proposed signal- and segment-dependent band-importance functions.
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May 01 2009
Objective measures for predicting speech intelligibility in noisy conditions based on new band-importance functions
Jianfen Ma;
Jianfen Ma
a)
College of Computer Engineering and Software,
Taiyuan University of Technology
, Shanxi 030024, China and Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Texas at Dallas
, Richardson, Texas 75083-0688
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Yi Hu;
Yi Hu
Department of Electrical Engineering,
University of Texas at Dallas
, Richardson, Texas 75083-0688
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Philipos C. Loizou
Philipos C. Loizou
b)
Department of Electrical Engineering,
University of Texas at Dallas
, Richardson, Texas 75083-0688
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a)
Work done while Dr. Jianfen Ma visited Professor Loizou’s laboratory as a research scholar.
b)
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Electronic mail: [email protected]
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 125, 3387–3405 (2009)
Article history
Received:
August 08 2008
Accepted:
February 14 2009
Citation
Jianfen Ma, Yi Hu, Philipos C. Loizou; Objective measures for predicting speech intelligibility in noisy conditions based on new band-importance functions. J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 1 May 2009; 125 (5): 3387–3405. https://doi.org/10.1121/1.3097493
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