Toward a Nonspeech Test of Auditory Cognition: Semantic Context Effects in Environmental Sound Identification in Adults of Varying Age and Hearing Abilities

Sounds in everyday environments tend to follow one another as events unfold over time. The tacit knowledge of contextual relationships among environmental sounds can influence their perception. We examined the effect of semantic context on the identification of sequences of environmental sounds by adults of varying age and hearing abilities, with an aim to develop a nonspeech test of auditory cognition.).FEST scores revealed a strong positive effect of semantic context in all listener groups, with young normal-hearing listeners outperforming other groups. FEST scores also correlated with other measures of cognitive ability, and for CI users, with the intelligibility of speech-in-noise.Being sensitive to semantic context effects, FEST can serve as a nonspeech test of auditory cognition for diverse listener populations to assess and potentially improve everyday listening skills