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Dear auditory list, Please spread the word about this PhD studentship to (UK-resident) students who would have the skill-set to start a PhD project on
Adapting sound-tracks for listeners with hearing loss (see description below) at Queen’s University Belfast. If you would be interested in taking on this project, please discuss it with Dr Trevor Agus (t.agus@xxxxxxxxx) as soon as possible.
These awards support a student (who meets DfE residency requirements) for three years, with fees and (for those eligible) a stipend. There is information on the eligibility requirements for DfE awards, as
well as information on the value of the award to the postgraduate research student, here: https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/department-economy-studentships. Please note that
DfE studentships are open only to UK/EU students and if an EU candidate is successful they will receive a fees-only award. (If this excludes you but projects like this would be of interest to you, please make contact nonetheless.) This funding became available
at short notice and we need to appoint a candidate in the week beginning 9th August. PhD Project Description The primary role of a hearing aid is to restore audibility, amplifying the quietest sounds enough to be heard while avoiding making the loudest sounds uncomfortably or dangerously loud. Strategies have
been evolved to enhance real-world sounds with less than a 10-millisecond delay while minimising the perceptual consequences of processing the sound so rapidly. However, much audio content is now consumed in a pre-recorded form, so more extensively pre-processed
versions of it could be delivered by either headphones or Bluetooth hearing aids (Agus & Corrigan, 2018) In this context, there is far less pressure to process the sound quickly, which paves the way for many more strategies to counteract the many perceptual
consequences of hearing losses. It is likely that preferences for adaptations will vary depending on audio content and individual preferences (Shirley et al., 2017).
To take this work forward, we seek a doctoral researcher to develop, implement, and test strategies to improve the audibility of TV and film sound-tracks based on audiological principles. The project would
combine computational signal-processing skills with psychological methods to explore the perceptions and preferences of listeners with a range of hearing losses. There is scope within the project to focus more on signal-processing strategies (for example to
detect and accommodate the different dynamic ranges of TV and film soundtracks) or more on the psychoacoustical testing (for example to elucidate the perceptual basis of undesirable artefacts of the adapted audio). The candidate will receive training for both signal processing and psychoacoustical tests at SARC and the School of Psychology. The project would be suited to someone with a background in engineering or
acoustics or with a background in psychology or audiology and experience of (or willingness to learn) programming and signal processing. Supervisors:
Dr Trevor Agus (SARC) and
Dr Matthew Rodger (Psychology) Additional advisors:
Prof. Josh Reiss (C4DL, QMUL) and
Chris Corrigan (SARC) Belfast is a great place to live:
https://www.qub.ac.uk/about/Living-in-Northern-Ireland/Life-in-Belfast/ Best wishes,
Trevor Agus |
SARC/Music | School of Arts, English and Languages | Tel: +44 (0) 28 9097 4445 Queen’s University Belfast, University Road, Belfast BT7 1NN, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom https://www.facebook.com/qubmusicteam https://twitter.com/QUBMusicteam |