Title
Effects of noise on arousal in a speech communication setting.
Abstract
Speech communication in natural environments is often impaired by varying levels of ambient noise. Such noise can reduce speech intelligibility and make conversations more effortful, consequently causing an increase in arousal, frustration or stress in the partaking speakers. This contribution investigates the effects of background noise on arousal in a speech communication setting using collaborative tasks and examines the measurability of such detrimental effects through physiological signals heart rate variability and skin conductance. We focus on the differences in responses between the various noise conditions aiming to establish the sensitivity of the employed physiological measures. Furthermore, self-reported mental effort scores are used to assess the dependency of subjective mental effort requirements on background noise for the examined communication setting. Our results indicate that while mental effort scores show a significant positive relationship with background noise level, skin conductance and heart rate variability features, which are commonly employed for arousal state detection, may be inappropriate and lack sensitivity to distinguish communication settings differing solely by the level of background noise.
Year
DOI
Venue
2017
10.1016/j.specom.2017.02.001
Speech Communication
Keywords
Field
DocType
Arousal,Heart rate,Skin conductance,Speech communication,Noise,Communication effort
Arousal,Background noise,Speech communication,Computer science,Heart rate variability,Ambient noise level,Speech recognition,Communication noise,Intelligibility (communication),Skin conductance
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
88
C
0167-6393
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
0
0.34
9
Authors
4
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Nemanja Cvijanovic100.68
Patrick Kechichian261.91
Kees Janse371.87
Armin Kohlrausch422719.66