SPEECH RECOGNITION APPARATUS FOR AV EQUIPMENT

A low-cost speech recognition apparatus for AV equipment capable of speech recognition with high accuracy while 2-channel sound is being produced from loudspeakers is achieved. A monaural conversion part converts 2-channel signals to be inputted to the loudspeakers into a monaural signal. A single echo canceller is provided with an output from a microphone and an output from the monaural conversion part (monaural signal). The echo canceller estimates an echo of multichannel sound based on the monaural signal, and then eliminates the echo sound from the microphone output. Thus, with only a single echo canceller, speech recognition can be carried out while 2-channel sound is being produced from the loudspeakers. Moreover, unlike the case where two echo cancellers are provided, the present invention can prevent the occurrence of mutual interference between the echo cancellers that leads to deterioration in speech recognition performance.