Lukas Suveg, Au.D.
PhD Candidate
Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Using Visual World Eye Tracking While Measuring Unmasking of Target Speech
Spatial separation of target and competing speech can improve the accuracy with which listeners, including those with bilateral cochlear implants, identify the target speech. Even if measurement of this benefit were implemented in routine clinical practice, behavioral measures like percent correct scores are not designed to provide insight into the momentary accumulation of perceptual salience of auditory stimuli that informs the ultimate judgment regarding the target speech. In this study, we adapted the “visual world paradigm,” wherein eye-gaze was monitored as participants selected, on a computer monitor, the image representing a spoken target stimulus. This novel study was designed primarily to investigate the effect of target-masker spatial configuration on certainty of target identity. Eye gaze behaviors unfolding over the time course of target determination were measured along with time to decision and percent correct, to test the hypothesis that spatial separation of a target and masker increases the certainty with which targets are identified. In addition to results from 20 typically hearing listeners, I will share preliminary data from the initial bilateral cochlear implant recipients enrolled in this ongoing study.