Archives of Acoustics, 43, 1, pp. 123–128, 2018
10.24425/118087

The Effects of the Noise and Reverberation on the Working Memory Span of Children

Peng JIANXIN
South China University of Technology
China

Jiang PENG
South China University of Technology
China

Three different reverberation time (RT) conditions were obtained by room acoustical simulation. The working memory span of grades 3 (8 to 9 years old) and 6 children (11 to 12 years old) was tested under these reverberation conditions with different signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) by headphone reproduction in a quiet classroom. The working memory span scores (WMSSs) were obtained under the different RTs and SNRs conditions. The results demonstrated that children’s age, RT and SNR had significant effect on children’s WMSSs. With the increase of SNR and the decrease of RT, the WMSSs increased gradually. Under the same SNR and RT condition, the children’s WMSSs were increased with the increase of their age. Multiple linear regression analysis shows that children’s WMSSs are related to age, RT and SNR, and the correlation coefficient is 0.99.
Keywords: reverberation time; signal-to-noise ratio; working memory span; children
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Copyright © Polish Academy of Sciences & Institute of Fundamental Technological Research (IPPT PAN).

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DOI: 10.24425/118087