Brad Rakerd
Dept. of Audiol. and Speech Sci., Michigan State Univ., East Lansing, MI 48824
Philip F. Seitz
Gallaudet Univ., Washington, DC 20002
Individuals with sensorineural hearing impairment have been shown to devote a larger than normal share of their attention to speech processing when listening in situations that afford access to audio speech cues only. Attentional commitments may prove to be more nearly normal if both audio and visual speech cues are available. To test this possibility, a studio-quality videotape has been developed for use in primary-task and dual-task studies of attention and speech perception. Markers on the tape make it possible to maintain coordination with a computer. The timing of speech events is specified to within a few milliseconds, potentiating subject reaction time measurements. There are three sets of stimulus materials: (i) 30 to 45s samples of connected discourse; (ii) triplets of phonetically balanced monosyllabic words, arranged in an ABX format for discrimination experiments; and (iii) randomized lists of words and phonetically matched nonwords for lexical decision experiments. Copies of the videotape, along with supporting software and other test materials, are available upon request. [Work supported by NIH-NIDCD.]