Dichotic bands of speech with amplitude compression

The Modified Rhyme Test was used to obtain speech discrimination scores at a most comfortable level in noise for nine sensorineural hearing impaired subjects for four test conditions; monotic, monotic with two-band amplitude compression, dichotic, and dichotic with two-band amplitude compression. The amplitude compression employed high and low passbands with cut-off frequencies of l500 Hz and compression ratios of 3:l for the high-band and 2:l for the low-band.I For the monotic condition the two bands were combined in one ear while in the dichotic conditions each band was presented at a different ear. Analysis of the data revealed that no significant differences existed between any of the test conditions. . Several subjects showed some improvement in speech discrimination for different test conditions, but as a group the subjects demonstrated no improvement in speech discrimination when the processed speech was compared to a linear monotic condition.