Speech
Recognition & Aging Lab 
My research focuses on speech
understanding deficits among aging, hearing-impaired individuals. Specifically, I am interested in the growing body of evidence that suggests older adults
have difficulty processing binaural auditory information (i.e., binaural interference). Current projects in the Speech
Recognition and Aging Lab are examining:
1. the relationship between dichotic word recognition and word
recognition in a competing message among young and older adult listeners;
2. lexical effects on
dichotic word recognition using the Neighborhood Activation Model of
speech perception; and
3. the examination of
dichotic performance-intensity functions for monosyllabic words and digits.
I believe these projects will aid in
defining an audiologic profile of older adults that exhibit binaural processing
deficits. Results from this area of
research are relevant to the clinical practice of audiology since a decline in
binaural auditory processing has been associated with a lack of benefit from
binaural amplification, a common form of audiologic rehabilitation for older
adults with sensorineural hearing loss.
Research Collaborations:
Colleen
M. Noe, Ph.D., Mt. Home VAMC, TN
Elizabeth Leigh-Paffenroth,
Ph.D., Mt. Home VAMC, TN
Kirstin E. Chiasson, Ph.D.,
Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Columbus OH
Other Research Activities: Telephone
Speech Enhancement Project
Lab
Personnel
Katie Lamoreau, Au.D. Student Kelsey Egelhoff, Ph.D. Student Christina M.
Roup, Lab PI
SR&A Lab, Pressey Hall, Department of Speech & Hearing Science,
The