Speech and Non-Speech Auditory Task Performance by Non-Native English Speakers

Objectives: The goal of this study was to determine if performance on speech and non-speech clinical measures of auditory perception differs between two groups of adults: self-identified native speakers of English and non-native speakers of English who speak Spanish as a first language. The overall objective was to establish whether auditory perception tests developed for native English speakers are appropriate for bilingual Spanish-speaking adults who self-identify as non-native speakers of English. A secondary objective was to determine whether relative performance on English- and Spanish-language versions of a closed-set speech perception in noise task could accurately predict native-like performance on a battery of English language–dependent tests of auditory perception. Design: Participants were young, normal-hearing adults who self-identified as either native speakers of American English (n = 50) or as non-native speakers of American English (NNE; n = 25) who spoke Spanish as their first language. Participants completed a battery of perceptual tests, including speech tests (e.g., Quick Speech-in-Noise, time-compressed reverberant Quick Speech-in-Noise, etc.) and non-speech tests (Gaps in Noise, Frequency Pattern test, Duration Pattern test, Masking Level Difference). The English version of the Oldenburg Sentence test (OLSA) was administered to both groups; NNE participants also completed the Spanish version of the OLSA. Results: Analyses indicate that the native speakers of the American English group performed significantly better than the NNE group on all speech-based tests and on the two pattern recognition tests. There was no difference between groups on the remaining non-speech tests. For the NNE group, a difference of more than 2 SD on group-normalized scores for the English and Spanish OLSA accurately predicted poorer than normal performance on two or more tests of auditory perception with a language-dependent component either in the instructions or the stimuli. Conclusions: The results indicate that a number of English-based tests designed to assess auditory perception may be inappropriate for some Spanish-English bilingual adults. That is, some bilingual adults may perform worse than expected on tests that involve perceiving spoken English, in part because of linguistic differences, and not because of unusually poor auditory perception. The results also support the use of preliminary speech-in-noise screening tests in each of a bilingual patient’s languages to establish if auditory perception tests in English are appropriate for a given individual. If a non-native English speaker’s screening performance is worse in English than in the native language, one suggested strategy is to select auditory perceptual tests that are impacted minimally or not at all by linguistic differences.