Normative Performance On The Connected Speech Test
Abstract
The Connected Speech Test (CST) assesses an individual’s ability to understand everyday contextualized running speech amidst competing background babble. To improve the validity and reliability of the test, an updated version was developed, by Saleh et al. (2020), with a General American accent to replace the Southern U.S. accent in the original CST. To evaluate normative performance on this updated test, forty native English-speaking adults with normal hearing were recruited. Multitalker babble was presented at a fixed level, and speech was presented at varying levels to participants in either a co-located or separated loudspeaker condition. At each SNR, participants were scored based on keywords correctly identified. Subjective speech recognition and listening effort were evaluated using a self-report scale. Results showed significantly better performance in the separated loudspeaker condition, indicating a spatial release from masking. For both conditions, performance and subjective speech recognition increased, while listening effort decreased with increasing SNRs.