Children's Perception of Speech in Multitalker Babble

Children 5, 9, and 11 years of age and young adults attempted to identify the final word of sentences recorded by a female speaker. The sentences were presented in two levels of multitalker babble, and participants responded by selecting one of four pictures. In a low-noise condition, the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) was adjusted for each age group to yield 85% correct performance. In a high-noise condition, the SNR was set 7 dB lower than the low-noise condition. Although children required more favorable SNRs than adults to achieve comparable performance in low noise, an equivalent decrease in SNR had comparable consequences for all age groups. Thus age-related differences on this task can be attributed primarily to sensory factors.