The Development of Constant Items for Speech Discrimination Testing

Subjects were English-speaking adults with hearing impairment. Etiology of hearing loss did not enter into selection. Consonant errors were observed on speech discrimination test lists employing a closed-set response system. Fifteen subjects were employed for the first list and 20 each for the remaining four lists, with an occasional subject serving in more than one group. Confusions between unvoiced and voiced consonants rarely occurred; the /r/ and /l/ were seldom confused with other phonemes; and nasals were seldom confused with non-nasals. Discrimination difficulty was related to both place and manner of articulation.