The effect of visual distraction on auditory-visual speech perception by younger and older listeners

Visual distractions are present in real-world listening environments, such as conversing in a crowded restaurant. This study examined the impact of visual distractors on younger and older adults' ability to understand auditory-visual (AV) speech in noise. AV speech stimuli were presented with one competing talker and with three different types of visual distractors. SNR50 thresholds for both listener groups were affected by visual distraction; the poorest performance for both groups was the AV + Video condition, and differences across groups were noted for some conditions. These findings suggest that older adults may be more susceptible to irrelevant auditory and visual competition in a real-world environment.