Russo Frank A, Pichora-Fuller M Kathleen
Department of Psychology, Ryerson University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Ear Hear. 2008 Oct;29(5):746-60. doi: 10.1097/AUD.0b013e31817bdd1f.
To examine age-related differences in listening to speech in music.
In the first experiment, the effect of music familiarity on word identification was compared with a standard measure of word identification in multitalker babble. The average level of the backgrounds was matched and two speech-to-background ratios were tested. In the second experiment, recognition recall was measured for background music heard during a word identification task.
For older adults, word identification did not depend on the type of background, but for younger adults word identification was better when the background was familiar music than when it was unfamiliar music or babble. Younger listeners remembered background music better than older listeners, with the pattern of false alarms suggesting that younger listeners consciously processed the background music more than older listeners. In other words, younger listeners attempted to "tune in" the music background, but older listeners attempted to "tune out" the background.
These findings reveal age-related differences in listening to speech in music. When older listeners are confronted with a music background they tend to focus attention on the speech foreground. In contrast, younger listeners attend to both the speech foreground and music background. When music is familiar, this strategy adopted by younger listeners seems to be beneficial to word identification.
研究在音乐环境中聆听语音时与年龄相关的差异。
在第一个实验中，将音乐熟悉度对单词识别的影响与在多人交谈杂音中单词识别的标准测量方法进行比较。匹配背景的平均水平，并测试两种语音与背景的比例。在第二个实验中，测量在单词识别任务中听到的背景音乐的识别回忆。
对于老年人来说，单词识别不依赖于背景类型，但对于年轻人来说，当背景是熟悉的音乐时，单词识别比背景是不熟悉的音乐或杂音时更好。年轻听众比年长听众更好地记住背景音乐，误报模式表明年轻听众比年长听众更有意识地处理背景音乐。换句话说，年轻听众试图“收听”音乐背景，而年长听众试图“忽略”背景。
这些发现揭示了在音乐环境中聆听语音时与年龄相关的差异。当年长听众面对音乐背景时，他们倾向于将注意力集中在语音前景上。相比之下，年轻听众既关注语音前景也关注音乐背景。当音乐熟悉时，年轻听众采用的这种策略似乎有利于单词识别。
