scholarly journals Hearing-Impaired Listeners Show Reduced Attention to High-Frequency Information in the Presence of Low-Frequency Information

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 233121652094551
Author(s):  
Elin Roverud ◽  
Judy R. Dubno ◽  
Gerald Kidd
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Divided Attention ◽  
Discrimination Task ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Discrimination Performance ◽  
Pattern Discrimination ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Frequency Separation ◽  
Hearing Sensitivity ◽  
Frequency Information

Many listeners with sensorineural hearing loss have uneven hearing sensitivity across frequencies. This study addressed whether this uneven hearing loss leads to a biasing of attention to different frequency regions. Normal-hearing (NH) and hearing-impaired (HI) listeners performed a pattern discrimination task at two distant center frequencies (CFs): 750 and 3500 Hz. The patterns were sequences of pure tones in which each successive tonal element was randomly selected from one of two possible frequencies surrounding a CF. The stimuli were presented at equal sensation levels to ensure equal audibility. In addition, the frequency separation of the tonal elements within a pattern was adjusted for each listener so that equal pattern discrimination performance was obtained for each CF in quiet. After these adjustments, the pattern discrimination task was performed under conditions in which independent patterns were presented at both CFs simultaneously. The listeners were instructed to attend to the low or high CF before the stimulus (assessing selective attention to frequency with instruction) or after the stimulus (divided attention, assessing inherent frequency biases). NH listeners demonstrated approximately equal performance decrements (re: quiet) between the two CFs. HI listeners demonstrated much larger performance decrements at the 3500 Hz CF than at the 750 Hz CF in combined-presentation conditions for both selective and divided attention conditions, indicating a low-frequency attentional bias that is apparently not under subject control. Surprisingly, the magnitude of this frequency bias was not related to the degree of asymmetry in thresholds at the two CFs.

Frequency-Discrimination Ability of Hearing-Impaired Listeners

1981 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 108-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. M. Zurek ◽  
C. Formby
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
Frequency Modulation ◽  
Hearing Threshold ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Frequency Discrimination ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Discrimination Ability ◽  
Hearing Sensitivity

Thresholds for frequency modulation were measured by an adaptive, two-alternative, forced-choice method with ten listeners: eight who showed varying degrees of sensorineural hearing impairment, and two with normal-hearing sensitivity. Results for test frequencies spaced at octave intervals between 125 and 4000 Hz showed that, relative to normal-hearing listeners, the ability of the hearing-impaired listeners to detect a sinusoidal frequency modulation: (1) is diminished above a certain level of hearing loss; and (2) is more disrupted for low-frequency tones than for high-frequency tones, given the same degree of hearing loss at the test frequency. The first finding is consistent with that of previous studies which show a general deterioration of frequency-discrimination ability associated with moderate, or worse, hearing loss. It is proposed that the second finding may be explained: 1) by differential impairment of the temporal and place mechanisms presumed to, encode pitch at the lower and higher frequencies, respectively; and/or, 2) for certain configurations of hearing loss, by the asymmetrical pattern of cochlear excitation that may lead to the underestimation, from measurements of threshold sensitivity, of hearing impairment for low-frequency tones and consequently to relatively large changes in frequency discrimination for small shifts in hearing threshold.

Temporal Processing in Low-Frequency Channels: Effects of Age and Hearing Loss in Middle-Aged Listeners

2011 ◽  
Vol 22 (07) ◽  
pp. 393-404 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth D. Leigh-Paffenroth ◽  
Saravanan Elangovan
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Word Recognition ◽  
Temporal Processing ◽  
Background Noise ◽  
Pure Tone ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Gap Detection ◽  
Middle Aged ◽  
Hearing Sensitivity

Background: Hearing loss and age interfere with the auditory system's ability to process temporal changes in the acoustic signal. A key unresolved question is whether high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss (HFSNHL) affects temporal processing in the low-frequency region where hearing loss is minimal or nonexistent. A second unresolved question is whether changes in hearing occur in middle-aged subjects in the absence of HFSNHL. Purpose: The purpose of this study was twofold: (1) to examine the influence of HFSNHL and aging on the auditory temporal processing abilities of low-frequency auditory channels with normal hearing sensitivity and (2) to examine the relations among gap detection measures, self-assessment reports of understanding speech, and functional measures of speech perception in middle-aged individuals with and without HFSNHL. Research Design: The subject groups were matched for either age (middle age) or pure-tone sensitivity (with or without hearing loss) to study the effects of age and HFSNHL on behavioral and functional measures of temporal processing and word recognition performance. These effects were analyzed by individual repeated-measures analyses of variance. Post hoc analyses were performed for each significant main effect and interaction. The relationships among the measures were analyzed with Pearson correlations. Study Sample: Eleven normal-hearing young adults (YNH), eight normal-hearing middle-aged adults (MANH), and nine middle-aged adults with HFSNHL were recruited for this study. Normal hearing sensitivity was defined as pure-tone thresholds ≤25 dB HL for octave frequencies from 250 to 8000 Hz. HFSNHL was defined as pure-tone thresholds ≤25 dB HL from 250 to 2000 Hz and ≥35 dB HL from 3000 to 8000 Hz. Data Collection and Analysis: Gap detection thresholds (GDTs) were measured under within-channel and between-channel conditions with the stimulus spectrum limited to regions of normal hearing sensitivity for the HFSNHL group (i.e., <2000 Hz). Self-perceived hearing problems were measured by a questionnaire (Abbreviated Profile of Hearing Aid Benefit), and word recognition performance was assessed under four conditions: quiet and babble, with and without low-pass filtering (cutoff frequency = 2000 Hz). Results: The effects of HFSNHL and age were found for gap detection, self-perceived hearing problems, and word recognition in noise. The presence of HFSNHL significantly increased GDTs for stimuli presented in regions of normal pure-tone sensitivity. In addition, middle-aged subjects with normal hearing sensitivity reported significantly more problems hearing in background noise than the young normal-hearing subjects. Significant relationships between self-report measures of hearing ability in background noise and word recognition in babble were found. Conclusions: The conclusions from the present study are twofold: (1) HFSNHL may have an off-channel impact on auditory temporal processing, and (2) presenescent changes in the auditory system of MANH subjects increased self-perceived problems hearing in background noise and decreased functional performance in background noise compared with YNH subjects.

Acupuncture and Transdermal Electrostimulation in the Treatment of Deafness

PEDIATRICS ◽  
1975 ◽  
Vol 55 (6) ◽  
pp. 807-813
Author(s):  
Fred H. Bess ◽  
Daniel M. Schwartz ◽  
Linda I. Seestedt ◽  
Freeman E. McConnell
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Sensorineural Hearing Loss ◽  
Additional Data ◽  
Acupuncture Treatment ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Sensorineural Hearing ◽  
Hearing Sensitivity ◽  
Impaired Children ◽  
Hearing Impaired Children

A review and critique of the research on acupuncture and transdermal electrostimulation therapy in treating sensorineural hearing loss is presented. Of 111 subjects who had undergone acupuncture treatment only 4% showed improvement. Some of the subjects in these studies were noted to exhibit a decrease in hearing sensitivity. Additional data collected at our clinics on four preschool hearing-impaired children failed to provide evidence of improvement following acupuncture. Similar results are reported with transdermal therapy, suggesting that both procedures are inappropriate for the treatment of sensorineural hearing loss.

scholarly journals Identification and Discrimination of Sound Textures in Hearing-Impaired and Older Listeners

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 233121652110656
Author(s):  
Oliver Scheuregger ◽  
Jens Hjortkjær ◽  
Torsten Dau
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
Broad Class ◽  
Temporal Structure ◽  
Discrimination Performance ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Sensorineural Hearing ◽  
Identification Accuracy ◽  
Texture Discrimination ◽  
The Individual

Sound textures are a broad class of sounds defined by their homogeneous temporal structure. It has been suggested that sound texture perception is mediated by time-averaged summary statistics measured from early stages of the auditory system. The ability of young normal-hearing (NH) listeners to identify synthetic sound textures increases as the statistics of the synthetic texture approach those of its real-world counterpart. In sound texture discrimination, young NH listeners utilize the fine temporal stimulus information for short-duration stimuli, whereas they switch to a time-averaged statistical representation as the stimulus’ duration increases. The present study investigated how younger and older listeners with a sensorineural hearing impairment perform in the corresponding texture identification and discrimination tasks in which the stimuli were amplified to compensate for the individual listeners’ loss of audibility. In both hearing impaired (HI) listeners and NH controls, sound texture identification performance increased as the number of statistics imposed during the synthesis stage increased, but hearing impairment was accompanied by a significant reduction in overall identification accuracy. Sound texture discrimination performance was measured across listener groups categorized by age and hearing loss. Sound texture discrimination performance was unaffected by hearing loss at all excerpt durations. The older listeners’ sound texture and exemplar discrimination performance decreased for signals of short excerpt duration, with older HI listeners performing better than older NH listeners. The results suggest that the time-averaged statistic representations of sound textures provide listeners with cues which are robust to the effects of age and sensorineural hearing loss.

Consonant-Recognition Patterns and Self-Assessment of Hearing Handicap

1991 ◽  
Vol 34 (6) ◽  
pp. 1397-1409 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol Goldschmidt Hustedde ◽  
Terry L. Wiley
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
High Frequency ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Normal Hearing ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Self Assessment ◽  
Error Patterns ◽  
Consonant Recognition ◽  
Recognition Ability ◽  
Hearing Handicap

Two companion experiments were conducted with normal-hearing subjects and subjects with high-frequency, sensorineural hearing loss. In Experiment 1, the validity of a self-assessment device of hearing handicap was evaluated in two groups of hearing-impaired listeners with significantly different consonant-recognition ability. Data for the Hearing Performance Inventory—Revised (Lamb, Owens, & Schubert, 1983) did not reveal differences in self-perceived handicap for the two groups of hearing-impaired listeners; it was sensitive to perceived differences in hearing abilities for listeners who did and did not have a hearing loss. Experiment 2 was aimed at evaluation of consonant error patterns that accounted for observed group differences in consonant-recognition ability. Error patterns on the Nonsense-Syllable Test (NST) across the two subject groups differed in both degree and type of error. Listeners in the group with poorer NST performance always demonstrated greater difficulty with selected low-frequency and high-frequency syllables than did listeners in the group with better NST performance. Overall, the NST was sensitive to differences in consonant-recognition ability for normal hearing and hearing-impaired listeners.

Teacher Identification of Elementary School Children with Hearing Loss

1978 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard H. Nodar
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Hearing Loss ◽  
School Children ◽  
Elementary School Children ◽  
Total Sample ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Teacher Interviews ◽  
Teacher Screening ◽  
Children With Hearing Loss ◽  
Hearing Problems

The teachers of 2231 elementary school children were asked to identify those with known or suspected hearing problems. Following screening, the data were compared. Teachers identified 5% of the children as hearing-impaired, while screening identified only 3%. There was agreement between the two procedures on 1%. Subsequent to the teacher interviews, rescreening and tympanometry were conducted. These procedures indicated that teacher screening and tympanometry were in agreement on 2% of the total sample or 50% of the hearing-loss group. It was concluded that teachers could supplement audiometry, particularly when otoscopy and typanometry are not available.

The Occlusion Effect in Unilateral Functional Hearing Loss

1970 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-40
Author(s):  
Gary Thompson ◽  
Marie Denman
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Bone Conduction ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Clinical Implications ◽  
The Right ◽  
Occlusion Effect

Bone-conduction tests were administered to subjects who feigned a hearing loss in the right ear. The tests were conducted under two conditions: With and without occlusion of the non-test ear. It was anticipated that the occlusion effect, a well-known audiological principle, would operate to draw low frequency bone-conducted signals to the occluded side in a predictable manner. Results supported this expectation and are discussed in terms of their clinical implications.

The impact of hearing loss

ORL ro ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-65
Author(s):  
Mădălina Georgescu ◽  
Violeta Necula ◽  
Sebastian Cozma
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Hard Of Hearing ◽  
Hearing Impaired ◽  
Public Health Issue ◽  
Health Politics ◽  
Universal Newborn Hearing Screening ◽  
Newborn Hearing ◽  
Impaired Person ◽  
The Impact

Hearing loss represents a frequently met sensorial handicap, which has a major and complex impact not only on the hearing-impaired person, but also on his family and society. The large number of hard-of-hearing persons justifies the acknowledgement of hearing loss as a public health issue, which oblige to appropriate health politics, to offer each hearing-impaired person health services like those in Europe. These can be obtained through: appropriate legislation for mandatory universal newborn hearing screening; national program for follow-up of hearing-impaired children up to school age; national register of hard-of-hearing persons; smooth access to rehabilitation methods; appropriate number of audiologists, trained for health services at European standards, trained through public programs of education in the field of audiology.  

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