Waaramaa Teija, Kukkonen Tarja, Mykkänen Sari, Geneid Ahmed
Tampere Research Centre for Journalism, Media and Communication (COMET), Faculty of Communication Sciences, University of Tampere, Finland.
Faculty of Social Sciences/Logopedics, University of Tampere, Finland.
J Speech Lang Hear Res. 2018 Apr 17;61(4):973-985. doi: 10.1044/2017_JSLHR-H-17-0054.
Listening tests for emotion identification were conducted with 8-17-year-old children with hearing impairment (HI; N = 25) using cochlear implants, and their 12-year-old peers with normal hearing (N = 18). The study examined the impact of musical interests and acoustics of the stimuli on correct emotion identification.
The children completed a questionnaire with their background information and noting musical interests. They then listened to vocal stimuli produced by actors (N = 5) and consisting of nonsense sentences and prolonged vowels ([a:], [i:], and [u:]; N = 32) expressing excitement, anger, contentment, and fear. The children's task was to identify the emotions they heard in the sample by choosing from the provided options. Acoustics of the samples were studied using Praat software, and statistics were examined using SPSS 24 software.
The children with HI identified the emotions with 57% accuracy and the normal hearing children with 75% accuracy. Female listeners were more accurate than male listeners in both groups. Those who were implanted before age of 3 years identified emotions more accurately than others (p < .05). No connection between the child's audiogram and correct identification was observed. Musical interests and voice quality parameters were found to be related to correct identification.
Implantation age, musical interests, and voice quality tended to have an impact on correct emotion identification. Thus, in developing the cochlear implants, it may be worth paying attention to the acoustic structures of vocal emotional expressions, especially the formant frequency of F3. Supporting the musical interests of children with HI may help their emotional development and improve their social lives.
对25名使用人工耳蜗的8至17岁听力障碍（HI）儿童及其18名12岁听力正常的同龄人进行了情感识别听力测试。该研究考察了音乐兴趣和刺激声音特性对正确情感识别的影响。
孩子们完成了一份包含他们背景信息并记录音乐兴趣的问卷。然后，他们听取了由5名演员发出的语音刺激，这些刺激由无意义的句子和延长的元音（[a:]、[i:]和[u:]；共32个）组成，表达兴奋、愤怒、满足和恐惧。孩子们的任务是从提供的选项中识别他们在样本中听到的情感。使用Praat软件研究样本的声学特性，并使用SPSS 24软件进行统计分析。
听力障碍儿童识别情感的准确率为57%，听力正常儿童的准确率为75%。两组中女性听众的识别准确率均高于男性听众。3岁前植入人工耳蜗的儿童比其他儿童能更准确地识别情感（p < .05）。未观察到儿童听力图与正确识别之间存在关联。发现音乐兴趣和嗓音质量参数与正确识别有关。
植入年龄、音乐兴趣和嗓音质量往往会对正确的情感识别产生影响。因此，在开发人工耳蜗时，可能值得关注语音情感表达的声学结构，尤其是第三共振峰的频率。支持听力障碍儿童的音乐兴趣可能有助于他们的情感发展并改善他们的社交生活。
