The intelligibility of speech in noisy environments depends not only on the functionality of listeners’ peripheral auditory systems, but also on cognitive factors such as their language learning experience. Previous studies have shown, for example, that normal-hearing listeners attending to a non-native language have more difficulty in identifying speech targets in noisy conditions than do native listeners. Furthermore, native listeners have more difficulty in understanding speech targets in the presence of speech noise in their native language versus a foreign language. The present study addresses the role of listeners’ experience with both the target and noise languages by examining second-language sentence recognition in first- and second-language noise. Native English speakers and non-native English speakers whose native language is Mandarin were tested on English sentence recognition in English and Mandarin 2-talker babble. Results show that both listener groups experienced greater difficulty in English versus Mandarin babble, but that native Mandarin listeners experienced a smaller release from masking in Mandarin babble relative to English babble. These results indicate that both the similarity between the target and noise and the language experience of the listeners contribute to the amount of interference listeners experience when listening to speech in the presence of speech noise.

嘈杂环境中语音的可懂度不仅取决于听者外围听觉系统的功能，还取决于他们的语言学习经验等认知因素。例如，先前的研究表明，听力正常的听者在嘈杂的环境中比本地听者更难识别非母语的语音目标。此外，与外语相比，母语听众在其母语中存在语音噪声的情况下更难以理解语音目标。本研究通过检查第一语言和第二语言噪音中的第二语言句子识别来解决听众对目标语言和噪音语言的体验的作用。以英语为母语的人和母语为普通话的非英语为母语的人在英语和普通话 2-talker babble 中进行了英语句子识别测试。结果表明，两个听众组在英语和普通话牙语方面都遇到了更大的困难，但与英语牙语相比，普通话母语听众从普通话牙语中的掩蔽中获得了较小的释放。这些结果表明，在存在语音噪声的情况下收听语音时，目标和噪声之间的相似性以及听者的语言体验都会影响听者体验到的干扰量。但是，相对于英语胡言乱语，普通话母语听众从掩盖普通话胡言乱语中获得了较小的释放。这些结果表明，在存在语音噪声的情况下收听语音时，目标和噪声之间的相似性以及听者的语言体验都会影响听者体验到的干扰量。但是，相对于英语胡言乱语，普通话母语听众从掩盖普通话胡言乱语中获得了较小的释放。这些结果表明，在存在语音噪声的情况下收听语音时，目标和噪声之间的相似性以及听者的语言体验都会影响听者体验到的干扰量。