Chen Yufeng, Yang Yu, Zhang Xueying, Chen Fei
School of Literature, Shandong University, Jinan, China.
School of Foreign Languages, Hunan University, Hunan, China.
Int J Audiol. 2025 Jun;64(6):557-569. doi: 10.1080/14992027.2025.2456003. Epub 2025 Jan 31.
Lexical tone plays a vital role in speech communication in tonal languages. This study investigated lexical tone recognition in cochlear implant (CI) users, and identified potential factors that influence lexical tone recognition in the CI population.
We conducted a systematic search across eleven major databases, evaluated the risk of bias in the included studies, and conducted five meta-analyses.
Forty studies that utilised a multi-item alternative forced-choice paradigm were included to evaluate the performance of lexical tone recognition in CI users.
CI users performed worse at recognising lexical tones than normal hearing (NH) controls. Furthermore, bimodal stimulation could benefit lexical tone recognition for CI users in both quiet and noisy conditions. Besides, the pooled results showed a negative correlation between tone recognition accuracy and age at implantation, as well as a positive correlation between tone recognition performance and the duration of CI experience.
This study indicates that CI users could not recognise lexical tones at the same level as the NH population. The bimodal intervention does have a more positive effect than unimodal implantation regardless of the listening environment. Moreover, earlier implantation and longer experience with the CI could facilitate lexical tone recognition.
声调在声调语言的言语交流中起着至关重要的作用。本研究调查了人工耳蜗（CI）使用者的声调识别情况，并确定了影响CI人群声调识别的潜在因素。
我们在11个主要数据库中进行了系统检索，评估了纳入研究的偏倚风险，并进行了五项荟萃分析。
纳入了40项采用多项选择强迫选择范式的研究，以评估CI使用者的声调识别表现。
CI使用者在识别声调方面的表现比正常听力（NH）对照者差。此外，双耳刺激在安静和嘈杂环境中都有助于CI使用者的声调识别。此外，汇总结果显示声调识别准确率与植入时年龄呈负相关，声调识别表现与CI使用时长呈正相关。
本研究表明，CI使用者不能像NH人群那样识别声调。无论听力环境如何，双耳干预比单耳植入具有更积极的效果。此外，早期植入和更长时间的CI使用经验有助于声调识别。
