1.1. Research history of sentence test 1.1.1. Worldwide
1.1.2. Vietnam
Previously, many experts had been interested in researching about Vietnamese speech audiometry. Some word tests were developed. Those word tests had set the foundation for Vietnamese speech audiometry 1.2. Anatomy and physiology of hearing
Important characteristics of the hearing pathways
Signal from each ear is transmitted to the two cerebral hemispheres.
Highly oriented about frequency.
Figure 1.11. The audio frequency on the basilar membrane, the cochlea nucleus and the cortex diagram.
The most intelligent feature of cochlear implants is the arrangement of the tonotopic on the frequency at the cochlear. This is an important physiological basis for building sentence test on sound frequency.
1.2.3. Nerves pathway related to listening, understand and answering.
1.3. Speech audiometry
1.3.1. Speech audiometry applications
Measuring hearing ability by words has benefits on three aspects:
diagnostics - evaluation - hearing aids 1.3.2. Speech audiometry indicators.
1.3.3. Standard speech audiometry chart 1.3.4. The speech banana
1.4. Linguistic basis for building the Vietnamese sentence test.
In order to build the sentence test, we need to start from native patients’
phonetic characteristics, vocabulary and grammar.
The isolating and monosyllabic are the most two important properties of Vietnamese. Each syllable is pronounced separately and mostly each of them has meaning. In Vietnamese, sound is the intersection, the “3 in 1”
coincidence of 3 units: sound = syllable = morpheme = word. The basic unit in listening/understanding Vietnamese is not the phonemic like other European languages but it is syllable. Therefore, sound is also the initial and basic unit in evaluating the listening/understanding ability in Vietnamese. Based on the characteristics of phonetic, semantic and commonly used of sound, it can be classified into the chord sound and level of difficulty to build Vietnamese sentence test.
1.4.1. Vietnamese Phonology
1.4.1.1. Vietnamese syllable structure.
Vietnamese syllable has a rigid structure, divided into 2 levels. Level 1 includes mandatory elements, which are initial sound, rhyme and tone. Level 2 includes rhyme element, which are middle sound, main sound and last sound.
Structure of the two levels of Vietnamese syllable Tone
Initial sound Rhyme
Middle sound Main sound Last sound
Rhyme in Vietnamese
Vietnamese has 121 rhymes. Vietnamese rhymes are classified into 4 categories: close rhyme, half close rhyme, open rhyme, half open rhyme.
In rhymes, main sound has the function to create the syllable’s peak, characterized for rhyme’s timbre.
Main sound (vowel):. Vietnamese has 9 basic vowels: i /i/, ê /e/, e //, ư //, ơ //, a /a/, u /u/, ô /o/, o // and 3 basic diphthongs: ia, iê /i/; ưa, ươ /
/;uô, ua /u/. According to timbre, Vietnamese’s vowels are classified into 3 groups: 1- High timbre (tongue toward): /i, e, / i, ê, e; 2- middle timbre (tongue in middle): ): /, , a/ ư, ơ, â, a, ă; 3-low timbre (tongue back): /u, o, / u, ô, o. The timbres of diphthongs depend on the timbres of the initial vowels.
Last sound: can be half vowel /w/ (o,u), /j/ (i, y), nasal consonants /m, n, , / (m, n, nh, ng, ngh), voiceless consonants /p, t, c, k/ (p, t, ch, c). Not like other European languages, last consonants in Vietnamese are always implosive. The combinations of vowels and consonants are very strong and merge together.
Middle sound: only half vowels /w/(O or U).
Initial sound: is the mandatory element, always is consonant, has the opening function in Vietnamese. Like rhyme, initial consonant is independent. Unlike the combination of the vowel and last consonant, the combination of initial consonant with rhyme is rather loose. Vietnamese has 21 initial consonants, divided into 3 timbre groups: low timbre consonants:
/m/ m; /n/ n; // nh; // ng, ngh; /l/ l. Middle timbre consonants: // b, // đ
; /t/ t; /k/ c, k, qu; / / /v/ v; /z/ d, r; // g, gh. High timbre consonants: /f/ ph, /s/
x, s; /x/ kh, /h/ h; /c/ ch , /th/ th.
Vietnamese Tones: in phonetics, tone is the transformation of F0 during the pronouncing of syllable. There are differences in tone among the regions. Vietnamese Northern dialect has six tones: level, hanging, sharp, asking, tumbling and heavy.
1.4.2. Words in Vietnamese
1.4.2.1. Monosyllabic and multi-syllables words.
1.4.2.2. Vietnamese lexical categories 1.4.2.3. Basic and cultural words
1.4.2.4. Frequency of occurrence and the common level of words.
Common words are words used in daily communication. Statistically, in daily language, common words have the highest frequency of occurrence.
Common words are mostly monosyllabic and are basic words.
1.4.3. Sentences in Vietnamese
1.4.3.1. Classify sentences based on structure 1.4.3.2. Classify sentences based on purpose 1.5. Presbycusis
1.5.1. Definition 1.5.2. Anatomy 1.5.3. Classification
1.5.4. Diagnosis of presbycusis 1.5.5. Stages of presbycusis (3 stages)
Stage 1: Difficult to diagnose in clinical: decrease hearing ability in high frequency. No significant clinical signals.
Stage 2: Affecting social communication
Stage 3: Decrease hearing and communicating ability and then lead to loneliness.
1.5.6. Treatment: Hearing aid is necessary in the stages of social influence (phase 2). This is a very important solution in improving hearing ability.
Nowadays, we care for both sides, doctors and patients. The problem is determining the type of hearing aids, evaluating the efficiency and adjusting the device in order to choose the most suitable hearing aids for each patient.
1.5.7. Researches about presbycusis 1.5.7.1. Factors effecting presbycusis
1.5.7.2. Proportion of presbycusis: The society is developing every day, it increases the factors effecting presbycusis. Therefore, the proportion of presbycusis is growing. Speech audiometry in presbycusis is to determine the effects of presbycusis on communication, to find the signs of the central lesions and difficulties in differentiate sentences and especially important in choosing hearing aid device and
Speech audiometry in presbycusis helps to determine the extent of the influence of the patient to communicate, find out the signals of central lesions and the difficulty in distinguishing the words. Especially, Speech audiometry in presbycusis plays important roles in choosing the hearing aid and evaluating its performance and also in helping to prevent long-term consequences of deafness.
Chapter 2
RESEARCH SUBJECTS AND METHODS 2.1. Research subjects
Object 1
Common Vietnamese language: Research on 3 aspects:
phonetics, vocabulary and grammar in order to build the sentence test.
Students from 18-25 years olds: Check normal ENT, normal Pure tone audiometry to test the sentence test.
Sample 1: 30 Students to test the balance between the groups of