Associations Between Auditory Working Memory, Self-Perceived Listening Effort, and Hearing Difficulty in Adults With Mild Traumatic Brain Injury.

Objectives: Mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) can have persistent effects in the auditory domain (e.g., difficulty listening in noise), despite individuals having normal pure-tone auditory sensitivity.

The relationship between extended high-frequency hearing and the binaural spatial advantage in young to middle-aged firefightersa).

Relationships between extended high-frequency (EHF) thresholds and speech-in-spatialized noise were examined in firefighters with a history of occupational noise and airborne toxin exposure. Speech recognition thresholds were measured for co-located and spatially separated (±90° azimuth) sentences in a competing signal using the Listening in Spatialized Noise-Sentences test. EHF hearing was significantly correlated with the spatial advantage, indicating that firefighters with poorer EHF thresholds experienced less benefit from spatial separation.

The Impact of Traumatic Brain Injury on Binaural Processing in Young and Middle-Age Adults.

Purpose: This study examined the impact of traumatic brain injury (TBI) on self-perceived hearing and suprathreshold binaural processing in young and middle-age adults.

Method: Ninety-three adults with normal hearing (thresholds ≤ 25 dB HL, 250-4000 Hz) participated in one of four groups: 38 young adults, 23 young adults with TBI, 16 middle-age adults, and 16 middle-age adults with TBI. Self-perceived hearing difficulty was measured via questionnaires.

The Importance of Professional Advocacy at the State Level: A Coalition Model.

Professional advocacy communicates a viewpoint for or against a policy or issue, and is used to influence change to public policy, legislation, and/or regulations. State audiology associations are perfectly positioned to organize advocacy efforts for the profession at the state level. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to review the types of advocacy available to state organizations and the steps for hiring a lobbyist.

Hearing Health Care Utilization Following Automated Hearing Screening.

Background: The study examined follow-up rates for pursuing hearing health care (HHC) 6 to 8 months after participants self-administered one of three hearing screening methods: an automated method for testing of auditory sensitivity (AMTAS), a four-frequency pure-tone screener (FFS), or a digits-in-noise test (DIN), with and without the presentation of a 2-minute educational video about hearing.

Purpose: The study aims to determine if the type of self-administered hearing screening method (with or without an educational video) affects HHC follow-up rates.

Research Design: The study is a randomized controlled trial of three automated hearing screening methods, plus control group, with and without an educational video.

The Impact of Speech Recognition Testing on State Anxiety in Young, Middle-Age, and Older Adults.

Purpose This study assessed state anxiety as a function of speech recognition testing using three clinical measures of speech in noise and one clinical measure of dichotic speech recognition. Method Thirty young adults, 30 middle-age adults, and 25 older adults participated. State anxiety was measured pre- and post-speech recognition testing using the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory.

Hearing Difficulties as a Result of Traumatic Brain Injury.

Background: Traumatic brain injury (TBI) has been shown to result in hearing difficulties (i.e., deficits in the processing of auditory information) without impacting pure-tone threshold detection.

Mild-Gain Hearing Aids as a Treatment for Adults with Self-Reported Hearing Difficulties.

Background: There is a growing body of evidence demonstrating self-reported hearing difficulties (HD; i.e., substantial difficulty in understanding speech in complex listening situations) in adults with normal pure-tone sensitivity.

The Effect of Lexical Content on Dichotic Speech Recognition in Older Adults.

Background: Age-related auditory processing deficits have been shown to negatively affect speech recognition for older adult listeners. In contrast, older adults gain benefit from their ability to make use of semantic and lexical content of the speech signal (i.e.

Individual Differences in Behavioral and Electrophysiological Measures of Binaural Processing Across the Adult Life Span.

Purpose: The purpose of the present study was to examine individual differences in binaural processing across the adult life span.

Method: Sixty listeners (aged 23-80 years) with symmetrical hearing were tested. Binaural behavioral processing was measured by the Words-in-Noise Test, the 500-Hz masking level difference, and the Dichotic Digit Test.

Evaluation of a telephone speech-enhancement algorithm among older adults with hearing loss.

Purpose: In this study, the authors evaluated a processing algorithm aimed at improving speech recognition via the telephone among older adults with sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL).

Method: Thirty older adults with SNHL participated. Speech recognition was measured in quiet using the Modified Rhyme Test (MRT; Kreul et al.

Behavioral and electrophysiologic binaural processing in persons with symmetric hearing loss.

Background: Binaural hearing improves our ability to understand speech and to localize sounds. Hearing loss can interfere with binaural cues, and despite the success of amplification, ∼25% of people with bilateral hearing loss fit with two hearing aids choose to wear only one (e.g.

Dichotic speech recognition using CVC word and nonsense CVC syllable stimuli.

Background: The effects of stimulus material, lexical content, and response condition on dichotic speech recognition performance characteristics were examined for normal-hearing young adult listeners. No previous investigation has systematically examined the effects of stimulus material with constant phonetic content but varied lexical content across three response conditions typically used to evaluate binaural auditory processing abilities.

Purpose: To examine how dichotic speech recognition performance varies for stimulus materials with constant phonetic content but varied lexical content across the free recall, directed recall right, and directed recall left response conditions.

Masking of low-frequency signals by high-frequency, high-level narrow bands of noise.

Low-frequency masking by intense high-frequency noise bands, referred to as remote masking (RM), was the first evidence to challenge energy-detection models of signal detection. Its underlying mechanisms remain unknown. RM was measured in five normal-hearing young-adults at 250, 350, 500, and 700 Hz using equal-power, spectrally matched random-phase noise (RPN) and low-noise noise (LNN) narrowband maskers.

Dichotic word recognition in noise and the right-ear advantage.

Purpose: This study sought to compare dichotic right-ear advantages (REAs) of young adults to older adult data (C. M. Roup, T.

Effect of dichotic listening on self-reported state anxiety.

The present study examined the relationship between dichotic speech recognition and state anxiety. State anxiety, as determined by the State-Trait anxiety inventory (STAI), was measured pre- and post-dichotic testing in a group of young adults with normal hearing. Dichotic speech recognition was measured for three types of speech stimuli: 3-pair digits, monosyllabic words, and consonant-vowels.

Hearing aid outcomes for listeners with high-frequency hearing loss.

Purpose: To determine whether listeners with primarily high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss (HF SNHL) perceived benefit from amplification provided by completely-in-the-canal (CIC) hearing aids.

Method: The Hearing Handicap for the Elderly-Screening version, the Abbreviated Profile of Hearing Aid Benefit, and the Satisfaction With Amplification in Daily Life questionnaires were mailed to 2 groups of listeners (n = 79) who matched preset criteria, including threshold at 2000 Hz and use of CIC amplification. Sixty-seven percent (n = 53) of the questionnaires were returned and were divided into 2 groups.

Perceptual training improves syllable identification in new and experienced hearing aid users.

We assessed the effects of perceptual training of syllable identification in noise on nonsense syllable test (NST) performance of new (Experiment 1) and experienced (Experiment 2) hearing aid (HA) users with sensorineural hearing loss. In Experiment 1, new HA users were randomly assigned to either immediate training (IT) or delayed training (DT) groups. IT subjects underwent 8 weeks of at-home syllable identification training and in-laboratory testing, whereas DT subjects underwent identical in-laboratory testing without training.

Acclimatization in wide dynamic range multichannel compression and linear amplification hearing aids.

Acclimatization was studied in hearing-impaired patients with no previous hearing aid (HA) experience who were fit bilaterally with either wide dynamic range multichannel compression (WDRMCC) or linear amplification (LA) HAs. Throughout 40 weeks of normal HA use, we monitored changes in nonsense syllable perception in speech-spectrum noise. Syllable recognition for WDRMCC users improved by 4.

Dichotic word recognition in young and older adults.

Dichotic word recognition was evaluated in free-recall, directed-attention right, and directed-attention left response conditions. All participants were right-handed and included a group of young adults with normal hearing and two groups of older adults with sensorineural hearing loss. Dichotic word recognition performance was best for young adults and decreased for each older group.

Tympanometric Screening Norms for Adults.

The purpose of this study was to reexamine the Margolis and Heller (1987) normative tympanometric data (also American Speech-Language-Hearing [ASHA], 1990 interim norms) using a strict control over subject age and gender. Normative values for peak, compensated static acoustic admittance (Peak Ytm), acoustic equivalent volume (Vea), and tympanometric width (TW) were determined for 102 young adults with normal hearing. Relative to the Margolis and Heller normative values, significant differences were found for Vea and TW.