Struggling to Communicate in a Noisy Cafeteria
No, this is not an observation from the coffee break. But we have all been there - trying to have a conversation in a bar, restaurant or crowded hotel lobby. And this is exactly the situation John Culling of Cardiff University focuses his research on.
Reverberation, says Culling, has a detrimental effect on listeners' perceptual segregation of speech from interfering sounds, such as competing speech. He thinks this effect has been less well explored than the distorting effect of reverberation on speech, but it may be very significant in spaces designed for social interaction.
Listen to John Culling's conclusions from the presentation.
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