Stuart,
Phatak and Allen (2007) looked at English consonants and a small number of vowels. That might be a good place to start. Most of the literature I know looks only at consonants (sometimes only at consonant manner & place contrasts).
Phatak, S. A., and Allen, J. B. (2007), “Consonant and vowel confusions in speech-weighted noise,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 121, 2312–2316.
If I may add my two cents though, I think that the comparison between Cs and Vs in this situation is not exactly a fair one, since they are inherently different in intensity. Traditionally, we define SNR over the entire stimulus, but a single CVC syllable at a given SNR can be broken down into two Cs that have a much less-favorable SNR than the vowel nucleus. So, at a nominal SNR, we are actually presenting the vowel at a much more favorable SNR. That ought to account for some of the robustness of vowels in noise.
On the other hand, if you’re simply interested in which elements of the signal are robust at a given long-term SNR, none of that matters.
Matt
the identification of consonants is more affected by speech-shaped noise than vowels, but can someone please provide a citation to a paper that discusses this issue thoroughly? A classic paper would be ideal.
Thanks for any help.
Yours - Stuart
P.S. I have been looking around for a while.
P.P.S. Surely Jont will let me know that it is all in Fletcher's book!