• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.41 no.1
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• pp.45-51
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• 2022

Sound quality evaluation is one of the psychoacoustic methods to measure subjective judgements for sound color. The purpose of this study is to investigate sound quality benefits of bimodal users by comparing sound quality scores between bimodal hearing condition and unilateral cochlear implant(CI) condition as a preliminary study. Thirteen bimodal users and seven unilateral CI users were participated in this study. Audiologists performed pure tone and speech audiometry and measured functional gain and real-ear insertion gain. Subjective assessment of sound quality was followed with four sounds including violin sound, male and female voices, and refrigerator noise. Participants judged the sound quality with six sound quality index. Bimodal users showed mean 0.8 points more sound quality improvements in bimodal condition than unilateral CI condition. Group comparison between bimodal and unilateral CI users showed no differences. A follow-up study of sound quality tools and methods should be considered to evaluate subjective bimodal benefits of cochlear implant users.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.41 no.1
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• pp.52-57
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• 2022

Speech consists of the sum of complex sine-waves. This study investigated the perception of electrical hearing by applying the sinusoidal model to cochlear implant simulation. Fourteen adults with normal hearing participated in this study. The sentence recognition tests were implemented using the sentence lists processed by the sinusoidal model which extracts 2, 4, 6, 8 sine-wave components and sentence lists processed by the same sinusoidal model along with cochlear implant simulation (8 channel vocoders). The results showed lower speech recognition for the sentence lists processed by the sinusoidal model and cochlear implant simulation compared to those by the sinusoidal model alone. Notably, the lower the number of sine-wave components (2), the larger the difference was. This study provides the perceptual pattern of sine-wave speech for electrical hearing by cochlear implant listeners, and basic data for development of speech processing algorithms in cochlear implants.

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.47-64
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• 2011

This study was to examine music preferences of school-aged cochlear implant(CI) recipients in comparison with normal hearing(NH) children. Participants were 12 CI recipients and 155 NH children. CI children were recruited from a hospital in Seoul and they had cochlear implants for longer than two years(M = 4.7). NH children were randomly sampled. All participants were asked to respond to a questionnaire and rate their music preferences. The results showed that while 58.33% of CI recipients preferred child voices, 71.61% of NH children preferred adult voices. For preferred frequency range, both of CI and NH groups preferred higher frequency. With regard to preferred musical styles, while CI children gave the highest rating(M = 3.58) to Korean folk songs on the 5-point Likert scale, popular music and TV and soundtrack music were found to be the highest-rated styles(M = 3.83) for NH children. These results indicate that self-rated music preferences of CI recipients may be affected by a musical environment that these children have experienced. The results also implies that the provision of appropriate musical input and experiences would significantly affect future music preferences and appreciation of CI children. Providing useful information about music preferences of CI recipients in comparison with NH children, this study has significant implications for further studies on this population.

• 재활복지
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.371-382
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• 2013

Recently, the number of those who were transplanted cochlear implants increased as health insurance increases has expanded. Last six years between 2005 to 2009, patients who received a cochlear implant surgery were about 3,300 and number of cochlear implants in adults of them have shown growing aspects. In the case of young children, they actively participated auditory training program after cochlear implant surgery and the studies related to auditory training in child are many, but the studies related to auditory training in adults is insufficient. In this study, we perform the auditory training for the female adult (age 54) received cochlear implant after language acquisition used Ling 6 sounds test, standardized consonants, vowels and sentences listening test and word recognition and confirmation test. As a result after auditory training for 10 weeks, she identified all phonemes in Ling 6 sound test and performed close to 100% in standardized consonants, vowels and sentences listening tests. Also, she improved the ability of real-world environmental sound and real-world words identifications by 57-95%. The results of this study showed the need of auditory training program with systematic and effective planning and considering the characteristics of the individual for adults.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.38C no.12
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• pp.1150-1158
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• 2013

Artificial cochlear implant system is known as the most efficient and widespread device to patients who have cochlear disorder. However, current commercialized artificial cochleas have inconveniences because of large volume size and high power consumption, requiring further research on improvements in terms of the size, power, and performance. In this paper, we will introduce our fully implantable artificial cochlear implant system, where small-size sensors and actuators are wirelessly connected, focusing on communication system design and its performance simulation.

• Information and Communications Magazine
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• v.27 no.9
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• pp.30-38
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• 2010

본 논문은 인간의 청각기능을 보조하거나 대체할 수 있는 차세대 청각보조장치 및 완전 이식형 인공와우에 관련한 기술동향에 대해서 기술한다. 청각보조장치는 MEMS 마이크로폰과 음장가시화 기술을 기반으로 하여 청각정보를 시각적으로 전달하고자 하는 장치이다. 이를 위해서는 초소형 MEMS 마이크로폰의 최적화 및 실시간 음장가시화 기술 개발이 선행되어야 한다. 차세대 생체모사 인공와우 기술은 기존 인공와우의 단점인 잦은 충전, 장애 노출 등을 극복하고 향상된 음감을 전달할 수 있는 완전 이식형 인공와우로서 그 기술동향을 논하고자 한다.

• Proceedings of the KSLP Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.144-145
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• 2003

고심도의 청각장애를 가진 아동의 음성은 높은 음도와 강도, 과비음 등 건청 아동과는 매우 다른 특성을 나타낸다. 그 중에서 초분절적인 요소에 속하는 억양은 청각장애 아동의 경우 단조롭고 높낮이 변화가 크지 않아서 의미전달에 어려움을 주는 중요한 요소이다. 청력손실이 고심도인 경우 수술을 하게 되면 청각적 수용능력을 높일 수 있어, 최근 부각되고 있는 인공 와우 이식수술을 받은 아동 또한 이러한 억양에서의 문제는 완전히 해결 받지 못하고 있다. 따라서 이 연구에서는 인공 와우 이식수술을 받은 청각장애 아동이 건청 아동과 억양에서 어떠한 차이를 드러내는지에 대해 알아보고자 하였다. (중략)

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.1-16
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• 2017

The purpose of this study was to examine changes in the accuracy and range of produced pitch in children with cochlear implants (CI) after an interval-based singing program. A total of three children with CIs aged 5 received twelve 35-minute individual sessions two to three times per week. The interval-based singing program was composed with third, fifth, and eighth intervals and implemented pitch discrimination, pitch imitation, and singing songs with target intervals in a sequence. At pretest and posttest, the changes in accuracy of pitch production during pitch imitation and singing were measured. The results demonstrated that all participants showed improvement in pitch accuracy and produced the target notes with great similarity to the expected pitches in the original song. The range of produced pitch also increased after the program. The results indicate that sequential trials to imitate pitches in a multisensory environment to facilitate the processing of pitch information may reflect how this population perceives pitch information and assist children with CIs to improve their pitch accuracy.

• Proceedings of the KOSOMBE Conference
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• v.1997 no.05
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• pp.203-206
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• 1997

본 연구는 G7 의료공학기술개발사업의 1차년도 연구결과이다. 본 연구의 최종목표는 청각계통중 내이의 손상에 의한 감각성 난청환자에게 소리를 인식할 수 있게 하는 한국형 인공와우의 개발, 전 음성 난청환자의 음성인식 효율을 높일 수 있는 한국형 인공이소골의 개발 그리고 인공와우 시술환자에게 적합한 재활용 프로그램을 개발하는데 있다. 이를 위하여 지난 1차년도에는 코클리어의 전기생리학적 현상을 규명하고, 이식전극시스템과 그 주변장치를 설계, 평가하였다. 그리고 한국인의 성인사체의 16귀를 측정하여 한국인 체형에 적합한 인공이소골의 설계기준을 확립하였다. 또한, 인공와우 시술 후 청력회복에 필요한 한국형 재활프로그램의 개발을 위하여 인공와우의 coding strategy에 따른 언어분별력 조사, 유소아의 어음특성분석등을 행하였다. 이 연구결과를 토대로 차기년도에는 상용화에 근접한 프로토타잎의 제품개발과 임상실험이 진행되리라 생각된다.

• Journal of rehabilitation welfare engineering & assistive technology
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.227-232
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• 2014

The aim of this study was to investigate phoneme recognition in postlingually deafened adults with cochlear implantation. 21-cochlear implantee were participated. They was used cochlear implants more than 1 year. In order to measure consonant performance abilities, subjects were asked for 18 items of Korean consonants in a "aCa" condition with audition alone. The scores ranged from 11 to 86 ($60{\pm}17$)%. The consonant performance abilities correlated with implanted hearing threshold level, significantly (p<.046). This results suggest that consonant performance abilities of postlingual deafened adults cochlear implantee be important for implanted hearing. They had higher correct rates for fricatives and affricatives with distinctive frequency bands than for plosives, liquids & nasals with the same or adjacent frequency bands. All subjects had confusion patterns among the consonants of the same manner of articulation. The reason of consonant confusions was caused that they couldn't recognize different intensities and durations of consonants with the same or adjacent frequency bands.