another word for speech discrimination

What Is Speech Discrimination?

When veterans apply for service connection for hearing loss, the VA will send them to a state-licensed audiologist to get their hearing evaluated. This exam will include a puretone audiometry test and a controlled speech discrimination test . A pure tone audiometry test measures the least audible sound that a person can hear, whereas the speech discrimination test asseses the veteran’s ability to understand speech from background noise. If a veteran’s speech discrimination is poor, the speech may sound garbled. 

During a speech discrimination test, veterans will wear headphones and be asked to listen to a list of common words spoken via a recording. As the veteran is listening to this recorded test, the examining audiologist will ask him or her to repeat the words that are being spoken. The audiologist will then use the number of words the veteran is able to successfully repeat to determine his or her percentage of speech discrimination. This test measures the veteran’s ability to understand speech at a comfortable listening level. The more difficulty a veteran has with speech discrimination, the lower his or her assigned speech discrimination percentage will be.

Under 38 CFR § 4.85 , VA rating evaluators use percent of speech discrimination, in addition to the veteran’s puretone threshold average, to determine the proper schedular disability rating to assign a veteran based on the severity of his or her hearing impairment:

Table VI: Numeric Designation of Hearing Impairment Based on Puretone Threshold Average and Speech Discrimination

The roman numeral designation determined from the first table is then used to determine the veteran’s schedular disability rating for hearing loss:

Table VII: Percentage Evaluations For Hearing Impairment

Horizontal (Poorer Ear) vs. Vertical (Better Ear) Hearing Impairment Determination Chart

Get Help With Your Hearing Loss Claim

If you are a veteran with hearing loss who is seeking assistance with your VA disability claim, please contact our office for a free claim evaluation. Our veterans disability attorneys are ready to help you get the compensation you are entitled to for your condition.

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What Is Speech Discrimination?

by Neil Bauman, Ph.D.

A lady recently asked me, “What is speech discrimination? How does it relate to hearing loss?”

Hearing loss is the result of damage to your ears. As a result, a person with a hearing loss needs more volume in order to hear the sounds that people with normal hearing can hear.

In contrast, speech discrimination is a measure of how well you understand what you hear when speech is loud enough to hear comfortably.

Audiologists measure speech discrimination in percent. If your discrimination scores are 100%, you understand everything you hear. At the other end of the spectrum, 0% discrimination means you can’t understand a single word that is spoken, no matter how loud it is.

Unfortunately, speech discrimination and hearing loss generally go hand in hand. For example, the last time I had my hearing tested, my hearing loss stands at 75 dB (a severe loss). Fortunately my speech discrimination is still relatively good at 80%. This means that, on the average, I understand 4 of every 5 words that are spoken if the volume is loud enough. That fifth word, however, just sounds like so much gibberish. This is one of the reasons I don’t depend on my hearing alone, but speechread the person at the same time. As a result, I have more difficulty understanding a person on the phone because I can’t speechread them.

If you have a hearing loss and your discrimination is good (80% or higher), typically you will find hearing aids very useful. However, if your discrimination is poor (below 40%), hearing aids will just make louder gibberish and thus are basically a waste of money.

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News & Events: Blog

News & events, what is language discrimination and how can you avoid it, so what exactly is language discrimination .

Have you ever been in a situation where people made jokes about how others have spoken, or maybe you were at work, and someone asked another person to talk in English, or perhaps it was as simple as witnessing others ignore people because they felt it was too challenging to try and understand what they are saying; if you have heard or seen this, then you have witnessed a form of language discrimination.

Reflecting on Subtle Workplace Discrimination

According to the US code section 1324b, employees are prohibited from discriminating against individuals based on their citizenship or immigration status, but how is this measured and upheld? The challenges faced by non-native English speakers and the discrimination that may follow can prevent them from working and supporting their families, specifically with financial stability, food, clothes, and adequate education.

For more information on employee rights Click Here .

What Does Language Discrimination Look Like?

Language discrimination is the unfair treatment of an individual solely because of their native language or other speech characteristics. Language discrimination, of course, can happen directly or indirectly. Suppose you're in the workplace bringing up a concern to your boss, you explain the situation as best as you can but are then dismissed, and when you try to speak up, what you are saying doesn't come across. Yet again, you are ignored. This type of language discrimination seems subtle but can make it very challenging. Imagine being in a situation where you cannot truly convey how you feel and what you are trying to say; this is what language discrimination could feel like, and it happened to one of our job seekers.

Did You Know...

An employer must show a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason to deny you an employment opportunity because of proficiency. This means that if an employee needs you to speak English for the safety of the job (such as when working in a warehouse or assembly), the employer must be explicit as to why they need you to be proficient in the language they request that you speak. Otherwise, this is known as language discrimination and can violate the US code section 1324b.

How Does This Pertain to Daily Work? 

There are times when we are working with job seekers looking for new opportunities, and in doing so, we find that they have been victims of language discrimination. The job seeker has either been the victim of or witnessed subtle exchanges between peers, jokes about their origin, or blatant dismissal based on this language barrier, leaving the job seeker feeling helpless.  Daily-Work makes it part of our goals to train out interns to help job seekers facing language barriers.  The interns go through an extensive orientation process that shows them how to help the job seekers understand their true potentials, capabilities while also strengthening their autonomy. Sometimes this can be listening to the job seekers, and other times, that can be consoling them that their experience was real, and they deserve to be treated with respect. 

Challenge Language Discrimination

Although it may be challenging to speak up when you notice subtle or direct behavior of language discrimination, it's important that you say something.

It is just as essential to check your own bias, prejudice, and the way you communicate with people who may not share the same native language as you do.

You can file a complaint here .

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noun as in belief without basis, information; intolerance

Strongest matches

animosity , bias , bigotry , chauvinism , discrimination , enmity , injustice , intolerance , preconception , predilection , predisposition , racism , sexism , xenophobia

Strong matches

ageism , antipathy , apartheid , aversion , contemptuousness , detriment , disgust , dislike , displeasure , illiberality , mindset , narrow-mindedness , partiality , pique , prejudgment , prepossession , repugnance , revulsion , slant , spleen , tilt , twist , umbrage , unfairness , warp

Weak matches

bad opinion , disrelish , foregone conclusion , jaundiced eye , misjudgment , one-sidedness , preconceived notion

verb as in influence another's beliefs without basis, information

bias , distort , harm , hinder , impair , poison , predispose , prejudge , skew , slant , sway , undermine , vitiate

angle , bend , blemish , color , damage , dispose , hurt , incline , indoctrinate , injure , jaundice , mar , prepossess , spoil , twist , warp

Example Sentences

They are flesh-and-blood evidence of the ways in which our prejudices and stereotypes hinder the economic stability of the hardest workers and professional advancement of some of this country’s most talented residents.

The duke, the lady and the baby-face queen — these characters’ struggles are not framed by slavery or prejudice.

As Hinds and other critics pointed out, the show also explicitly references slavery — so the “fantasy” of this 1813 is still anchored in the reality of systemic prejudice.

For once, death, and the death in life of prejudice, could claim nothing but the skeleton of an old man.

Quantum mechanics needs no particular interpretation if it is formulated without the preexisting prejudice that nature should exhibit cause-and-effect determinism.

I do, however, intend it to sound mean about the reactionary, prejudice-infested place she comes from.

A few days ago, he criticized his home state of Alabama for its entrenched prejudice.

But the exemption was also born of prejudice and discrimination.

So specious, in fact, that they are increasingly seen to be rationales to cover outdated forms of prejudice.

If The Biggest Loser could correct this misconception, it would do a lot to reduce anti-obesity prejudice.

Finally, let me ask the general reader to put aside all prejudice, and give both sides a fair hearing.

Thou fell spirit of pride, prejudice, ignorance, and mauvaise honte!

It is beyond the comprehension of any man not blinded by superstition, not warped by prejudice and old-time convention.

The last vestige of her prejudice against Indians had melted and gone, in the presence of their simple-hearted friendliness.

With Monsieur de Lussigny,” he interposed, “it is a matter of prejudice, not of principle.

Related Words

Words related to prejudice are not direct synonyms, but are associated with the word prejudice . Browse related words to learn more about word associations.

noun as in mental outlook

• disposition
• frame of mind
• inclination
• mental state
• perspective
• point of view
• predilection
• sensibility
• temperament
• where one is at

noun as in belief in one way; partiality

• discrimination
• illiberality
• intolerance
• narrow-mindedness
• one-sidedness
• partisanship
• preconceived idea
• preconceived notion
• preconceived opinion
• preconception
• predisposition
• prejudgment
• prepossession

verb as in cause to favor

• make partial

verb as in flaw, disfigure

verb as in distort, exaggerate

• misrepresent

Viewing 5 / 68 related words

From Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus, Third Edition Copyright © 2013 by the Philip Lief Group.

Related Words and Phrases

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Sound and Word Discrimination

The next foundational skill in phonological awareness and language is Sound and Word discrimination.

Auditory or sound discrimination is the ability to recognize similarities and differences between sounds. Mainly, sound discrimination allows people to distinguish between phonemes in words. Phonemes are the smallest units of sound in any given language. Sound discrimination allows someone to tell the difference between words and sounds that are similar and words and sounds that are different.

A child who has trouble with sound discrimination may have difficulty telling the difference between words such as “sister” and “sitter” or “cat” and “cot.” Overall, the children can’t distinguish between the slight differences in the sounds of words.

This problem can sometimes make it hard for children to understand what people are saying. This is exacerbated in noisy environments such as classrooms or even a child’s home if they belong to a large family or have loud music and television.

Sound and word discrimination plays an essential role in both language and reading development. To achieve literacy, children must have phonemic awareness; difficulties with auditory discrimination can challenge young readers.

If a child were reading a book or passage that included something about bees, they should notice that the word “bees” has three sounds “b,” “ee,” and “ZZ.”

Children with sound and word discrimination challenges may have trouble remembering the sequences of words and may also miswrite words.

Fortunately, with practice and oversight, children learn the different sounds and can discriminate words in short sentences very quickly.

The different levels of Mastery we look for in Sound and Word Discrimination

Level 1 – discriminating sounds in the environment.

The most basic level of auditory discrimination is hearing the difference between sounds in our environment, e.g., identifying the sound of a car passing, the noise of a fan turning, etc. The children should progress to identifying more closely linked sounds, e.g., different people’s voices or the difference between a car and a truck.

Level 2 – Discriminating between different words in speech

Once children can identify sounds in their environment, they are ready to move on to the next level of auditory discrimination. These first two levels should be set in KG, but can also be addressed in Lower Primary. Children become aware that speech is made up of individual words. They develop this skill through rhyme and rhythm activities when they clap, tap and stamp the rhythm of various rhymes.

Many activities you can do to develop these skills are quick, fun, and active to keep the children motivated and alert.

Level 3 – Discriminating syllables in words

Children first become aware that a sentence consists of individual words: The children listen to their teacher quietly.

Seven words make up this sentence. The chil-dren list-en to their tea-cher qui-et-ly. The sentence is now segmented into twelve individual syllables. The word teacher has two syllables: tea-cher. The word quietly has three syllables: qui-et-ly.

Level 4 – Discriminating rhyming words

The skill of hearing rhyming words is a crucial step towards being able to blend words. The child should give words that rhyme e.g. for cat, give sat, mat, hat, rat etc. If you give them a list of words like sun, run, hat, fun they should be able to spot the odd one out (hat). When teaching them about rhyme you can include playing with non-words e.g. lat, dat, gat as rhymes for cat.

Level 5 – Discriminating individual sounds in words

We want the children to identify individual sounds in words. Then the child can read words through blending and segmenting. The child can identify that bag is made up of three individual sounds – /b/ /a/ /g/ – blended together.

Children progress naturally through the early stages. For instance, parents rarely intentionally teach their children the sound made by a car or a fan – they learn it just from being exposed to sounds. But some children do need guidance from their teachers and parents to reach the higher levels of auditory discrimination.

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Synonyms and antonyms of discrimination in English

Discrimination.

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Synonyms of discriminating

• as in discriminatory
• as in distinguishing
• as in differentiating
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Thesaurus Definition of discriminating

 (Entry 1 of 2)

Synonyms & Similar Words

• discriminatory
• discriminative
• differential
• discriminational
• inequitable
• prejudicial
• segregative

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

• nondiscriminatory
• unprejudiced
• distinguishing
• characteristic
• distinctive
• identifying
• symptomatic
• unmistakable
• diagnostical
• idiosyncratic
• identifiable
• paradigmatic
• archetypical
• uncharacteristic

discriminating

Thesaurus Definition of discriminating  (Entry 2 of 2)

• differentiating
• differencing
• understanding
• contradistinguishing
• comprehending
• demarcating
• marking (off)
• setting off
• mixing (up)
• confounding
• lumping (together)

Examples of discriminating in a Sentence

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'discriminating.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Thesaurus Entries Near discriminating

discriminates

discrimination

Cite this Entry

“Discriminating.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/discriminating. Accessed 25 Oct. 2024.

More from Merriam-Webster on discriminating

Nglish: Translation of discriminating for Spanish Speakers

Britannica English: Translation of discriminating for Arabic Speakers

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2 Minute Speech on Discrimination in English

Good morning everyone, today I am going to give a speech on discrimination. Our world has always been divided into two groups: those who are discriminated against and those who are the discriminators. Discrimination is defined as the denial of opportunity or equal rights to a particular group of people who may be differentiated based on their gender, race, or religion.

However, prejudices and stereotypes could be mistaken for discrimination. Stereotypes are preconceived notions about a particular group of individuals based on their gender, culture, or religion. Stereotypes are the root of prejudice. It is to judge someone based on widely held prejudices.

Various factors, including gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, age, education, finances, employment hierarchy, disability, etc., all contribute to discrimination in today’s society. These all result from a persistent superiority complex, ignorance, and disregard for others’ identities.

Significant problems including racism, sexism, homophobia, and Islamophobia exist around the globe today. All of these problems compound one another to create an unjust, unequal, and generally toxic society.

We examine all the horrifying and violent deeds that have marred people throughout history as a result of bigotry. These discriminatory practices are now acknowledged and denounced, but they are still far from being eliminated. Government should create laws to prevent it, and parents and schools should teach kids about equality. Although the battle against discrimination is lengthy and difficult, we must never give up.

In conclusion, discrimination poses a threat to both society and the victim since it outright denies that the victim has equal value to others. It is an infringement on someone’s identity. Thank you.

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