Effects of noise suppression on intelligibility. II: An attempt to validate physical metrics.

Using the data presented in the accompanying paper [Hilkhuysen et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 131, 531-539 (2012)], the ability of six metrics to predict intelligibility of speech in noise before and after noise suppression was studied. The metrics considered were the Speech Intelligibility Index (SII), the fractional Articulation Index (fAI), the coherence intelligibility index based on the mid-levels in speech (CSIImid), an extension of the Normalized Coherence Metric (NCM+), a part of the speech-based envelope power model (pre-sEPSM), and the Short Term Objective Intelligibility measure (STOI). Three of the measures, SII, CSIImid, and NCM+, overpredicted intelligibility after noise reduction, whereas fAI underpredicted these intelligibilities. The pre-sEPSM metric worked well for speech in babble but failed with car noise. STOI gave the best predictions, but overall the size of intelligibility prediction errors were greater than the change in intelligibility caused by noise suppression. Suggestions for improvements of the metrics are discussed.