The Effect of Listeners' Anticipations on the Intelligibility of Heard Speech

Abstract

The experiment described demonstrates the effect of prior set on the intelligibility of heard speech. Twenty subjects hear the same twelve word sentences in the presence of noise on five occasions. The sentences fall into two groups — one unprefaced by any indication of topic, the other prefaced on each occasion by a different word, which subjects are told is the topic to which the group refers. Only one of the sentences in the latter group is fully appropriate to each word given. Wherever this conjunction occurs in the order of testing, the sentence involved reaches its highest level of intelligibility. When inappropriately prefaced, sentences are misinterpreted to a considerable extent or resist interpretation. “Speech is no more than a series of rough hints which the hearer must interpret…” —L. R. Palmer.