Data for: Intelligibility of face-masked speech depends on speaking style: Comparing casual, smiled, and clear speech
Description
This study was designed to quantify the impact of face mask-wearing on intelligibility across speech styles (casual, clear, smiled). We focused on one type of face mask, a fabric mask, which is commonly used in the COVID-19 pandemic to reduce hospital personal protective equipment (PPE) shortages (MacIntyre & Hasanain, 2020). The effects of fabric face masks on intelligibility has not, to our knowledge, been previously explored (but see Fecher & Watt (2011) for study of other types of fabric face coverings). Speakers produced 192 low predictability SPIN sentences (Kalikow et al., 1977) while in both face-masked and unmasked conditions in three speech styles (casual, clear, smiled) in 4-talker babble. Listeners consisted of 63 native English speakers (mean age: 20±1.4 years, range 18-25; 51 female, 1 non-binary, 1 transgender, 10 male), with no reported hearing impairments, from the UC Davis Psychology Subject Pool, who received course credit for participation. The experiment was conducted online using Qualtrics. The experiment began with a sound calibration procedure: participants heard one sentence produced by each speaker (not used in experimental trials) in silence at 60 decibels and were asked to identify the sentence from three multiple choice options, each of which presented a phonologically close target word (e.g., “I’m talking about the bench.”, “I’m talking about the wrench”, etc.). This ensured that participants heard the sound as played on their computers; after, they were instructed to not adjust their sound levels again during the experiment. Next, participants completed the speech-in-noise word identification task. On a given trial, participants heard a stimulus sentence (presented once only) and then were asked to type the final word. Assignment of a sentence to a Speaker, Masking Condition, and Speaking Style was pseudo-randomized across 4 lists and participants were randomly assigned to one of these lists. In total, each listener heard each of the 156 sentences once.