Auralization platform for hearing aid development
Translated title
Auraliseringsplatform for udvikling af høreapparat
Author
Bravo, Jorge
Term
4. term
Education
Publication year
2019
Abstract
Dette speciale undersøger, om en auraliseringsplatform kan gøre softwaretest af høreapparater mere tilgængelig ved at flytte lokaliseringstests fra fysiske opsætninger til et virtuelt miljø. Baggrunden er, at traditionel test er tidskrævende og dyr, og at placeringen af bag-øret-høreapparater (BTE-HA) reducerer vigtige rumlige ledetråde for retningshørelse. Projektets hovedspørgsmål er, om lokalisering i et virtuelt miljø kan matche en højttalerbaseret reference, samt hvordan forskellige sæt af hovedrelaterede overføringsfunktioner (HRTF) præsterer: målte BEC (blokeret øregang), målte BTE-HA og BTE-HA behandlet med et pinna-rekonstruktionsfilter (PRF). De målte HRTF-sæt dækker 616 retninger på en sfære. Ti forsøgspersoner gennemførte en lokaliseringstest med fire faser og tre runder, hvor lyde fra 16 højttalere skulle identificeres under forskellige betingelser. Resultaterne viser forskelle i præstation mellem HRTF-sættene, men samlet set indikerer de, at det anvendte virtuelle miljø ikke er egnet til formålet i sin nuværende form.
This thesis examines whether an auralization platform can make hearing-aid software testing more accessible by moving localization assessments from physical setups to a virtual environment. The motivation is that conventional testing is time-consuming and costly, and that behind-the-ear hearing aid (BTE-HA) placement reduces essential spatial cues for sound localization. The core questions are whether localization in a virtual environment can match a loudspeaker-based reference, and how different head-related transfer function (HRTF) sets perform: measured blocked ear canal (BEC), measured BTE-HA, and BTE-HA processed with a pinna reconstruction filter (PRF). The measured HRTF sets span 616 positions on a sphere. Ten participants completed a localization test comprising four stages with three rounds each, identifying sounds from 16 loudspeakers under various conditions. While the HRTF sets showed differing performance, the overall findings indicate that the virtual environment used was not suitable for reliable localization testing in its present form.
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