An Insight into Vowel Perception and Production by Children with Cochlear Implants and Children with Normal Hearing

Speech perception and speech production are two related complex processes. The success of cochlear implant can be evaluated only by studying both the perception and production. The present study compares the perception and production of the phonologically significant contrasts (vowels) of the children with cochlear implants with those of age matched normal hearing children. The vowel perception scores are slightly poorer in children with cochlear implants when compared to normal hearing group. Vowel back ness (bell/ ball) was easy to be perceived than vowel height (pin/ pen and put/pot) fetching better scores. Significant difference was seen in formant values of vowels between both the groups. Significant difference in vowel duration between both the groups can be due to lack of adequate auditory feedback for rapid and smooth production of complex motoric sequences of speech. Significant difference in word duration between both the groups can be due to prolongation of vowel segments and insertion of several inter syllabic pauses.