[Test-retest reliability of Mandarin acceptable noise level].

To evaluate test-retest reliability of Mandarin acceptable noise level(M-ANL) test materials. M-ANL was evaluated during three test sessions approximately one week apart, by testing 30 Mandarin-speaking people aged from 21 to 28 with normal aural/oral communication abilities. The participants completed the preference for background noise questionnaire before the first session. Analysis of the test-retest results were administered by SPSS 17.0 (Statistically Package for the Social Sciences Software Version 17.0). ANLs in the three sessions were (8.1 +/- 2.9), (7.4 +/- 2.2), (7.6 +/- 2.5)dB S/N, respectively. The correlation coefficients were 0.722, 0.746 and 0.849 between two of the three sessions. The correlation coefficients of the ANL and 7 questions of the questionnaire were below 0.3. M-ANL test materials are found to have good test-retest reliability. Listeners' preference for background noise is not related to their acceptance of background noise. Listeners cannot accurately assess their ability to accept background noise.