CONSONANT PERCEPTION BY USERS OF NUCLEUS AND CLARION MULTICHANNEL COCHLEAR IMPLANTS

A study was carried out to compare the consonant perceptions of five N ucleus multichannel cochlear implant users, five Clarion-CIS users, an d four Clarion-CA users. All subjects were administered the Iowa Media l Consonant Recognition Test in the auditory-only condition. The group s averaged approximately 1 year of implant use at the time of testing, and the average patient age at implantation was 47 years for the Nucl eus users, 60 years for the Clarion-CIS users, and 56 years for the Cl arion-CA users. The percent-correct scores for all three devices were variable and ranged from 34% to 84%, with each group averaging about 5 0% correct consonant recognition. Consonant feature information transm ission was calculated for five features: man ner of articulation, nasa lity, place of articulation, duration, and voicing. The highest inform ation transmission in the Nucleus group was for the features duration (71%), nasality (60%), and voicing (57%), which agrees with previous s tudies. The Clarion-CIS group had the highest information transmission for duration, place of articulation, manner of articulation, and nasa lity (50%, 29%, 28%, and 27%). The Clarion-CA group had the highest in formation transmission for the features voicing, place of articulation , and duration (41%, 40%, and 37%). This study indicates that the Clar ion device may carry some acoustic information related to place of art iculation, a feature that has not been found to be encoded well by oth er multichannel cochlear implants.