Nasalance and Intensity of Profound Hearing-Impaired Adults

심도 청각장애 성인의 비성도 및 강도

This study investigates the differences in nasalance across handicap, gender, and vowels and the correlation between nasal energy and oral energy both of which are used to compute nasalance. For this study, 20 hearing-impaired adults and 20 normal hearing adults as a control group were asked to read 7 Korean vowels (/$\alpha$, $\Lambda$, o, u, ɯ, i, $\varepsilon$/). Subjects' readings were recorded by NasalView and analyzed by Praat. Results showed that the hearing impaired group (HL) has a significantly higher nasalance than the normal hearing group(NH), and that there was a significant positive correlation between nasal energy and oral energy. A higher nasalance of the hearing impaired group seems to be due to an improper velopharyngeal control which is caused by lack of a proper auditory feedback.