THE INTELLIGIBILITY OF TWICE DETERIORATED SPEECH,

Abstract

Four aspects of distorted and controlled speech signals were tested with respect to the intelligibility of the signals: signal level, signal-to-noise ratio, the absence of acoustically weak segments, and periodic interruptions. Each distortion was represented in six degrees. From a mean intelligibility score of each condition, values of intelligibility were predicted for doubly distorted speech under assumptions that the distortions were non-overlapping and that a pair of distortions should produce the joint effect of the two singly. Thus, the predictions were made by multiplying the values associated with individual distortions. The results were in keeping with the assumption that the intelligibility of an imperfect communication system can be estimated if the relative effects of individual deterrents to intelligibility in the system are known. Although the assumption of joint probability is tenable as a first approximation, the error is more frequently in the direction of an over-estimation of the intelligibility of the signal rather than an under-estimation. (Author)

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Sep 01, 1964
Accession Number
AD0607847

Entities

People

  • John W. Black
  • Joseph G. Agnello

Organizations

  • Ohio State University

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Communication Systems
  • Cooperation
  • Distortion
  • Intelligibility
  • Language
  • Probability
  • Speech

Readers

  • Approximation Theory.
  • Computational Modeling and Simulation
  • Speech Processing/Speech Recognition.