Wearable Device With Speech and Voice Recognition for Hearing-Impaired People
Marwa M. Tharwat, Yasmin Wardak, Shumokh Balbaid, Ejlal Radin · 2024
Hearing impairment is a widespread health condition that affects millions of people worldwide. It refers to the lack of or low functionality of the hearing organs, resulting in difficulties in effective communication and participation in everyday conversations. This limitation can negatively impact various aspects of the social and personal lives of the hearing-impaired individuals. Moreover, the high cost and limited availability of assistive devices further restrict accessibility for those with limited financial resources. To address these challenges, this study develops an affordable wearable device equipped with speech and voice recognition technologies to enhance the accessibility of spoken language for individuals with hearing impairment. OpenAI Whisper is employed for real-time conversion of spoken words into written text. Voice recognition, utilizing Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients (MFCCs) and Random Forest (RF) classifier, identifies and distinguishes speakers within the user's family and friends zone. The recognized spoken words from the speech recognition process and the speaker's identity from the voice recognition process are combined and displayed on a screen to the hearing impaired. By combining speech and voice recognition technologies, the proposed device breaks communication barriers for individuals with hearing impairment and enhance their overall communication experience.