Habilidades auditivas em exames periciais de comparação de locutores

Abstract

Objective: To develop a consensus among speech-language-hearing therapists specialized in audiology regarding the hearing skills involved in forensic speaker comparison (SC). Method: The Delphi method was used in a panel of experts to obtain a consensus of the hearing skills associated with SC tasks. In Phase 1, five specialists in central auditory processing skills were interviewed by experts to gather their opinions on hearing skills possibly related to forensic SC tasks. Based on their answers, a questionnaire was constructed with 22 items regarding the nine SC tasks. Then, another 13 specialists were recruited to analyze each item and indicate their level of agreement on a 5-point Likert scale. The degree of agreement between judges was investigated with the content validity coefficient (CVC), thus selecting the final items in the consensus. Results: The specialists consulted in this research pointed to a consensus on the need for different auditory skills for the professional practice of experts speaker comparison (SC). The main skills with the highest CVC scores were: temporal resolution, temporal ordering, auditory closure and background figure. It is noted that for 18 items of the instrument analyzed by the specialists, the estimated value of CVC was greater than 0.80, showing a satisfactory level of consensus among the specialists in the domain studied. Conclusion: there was a consensus among specialists regarding the training of auditory skills to improve in specific forensic SC tasks.