Discrimination of consonants in quiet and in noise in Mandarin-speaking children with normal hearing.

Objective: Given the critical role of consonants in speech perception and the lack of knowledge on consonant perception in noise in Mandarin-speaking children, the current study aimed to investigate Mandarin consonant discrimination in normal-hearing children, in relation to the effects of age and signal-to-noise ratios (S/N).

Design: A discrimination task consisting of 33 minimal pairs in monosyllabic words was designed to explore the development of consonant discrimination in five test conditions: 0, -5, -10, -15 dB S/Ns, and quiet.

Study Sample: Forty Mandarin-speaking, normal-hearing children aged from 4;0 to 8;9 in one-year-age increment were recruited and their performance was compared to 10 adult listeners.