Exploring the cognitive effects of hearing loss in adult rats: Implications for visuospatial attention, social behavior, and prefrontal neural activity.

Age-related hearing loss in humans has been associated with cognitive decline, though the underlying mechanisms remain unknown. We investigated the long-term effects of hearing loss on attention, impulse control, social interaction, and neural activity within medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) subregions. Hearing loss was induced in adult rats via intracochlear neomycin injection (n = 13), with non-operated rats as controls (n = 10).

Hearing loss in juvenile rats leads to excessive play fighting and hyperactivity, mild cognitive deficits and altered neuronal activity in the prefrontal cortex.

Background: In children, hearing loss has been associated with hyperactivity, disturbed social interaction, and risk of cognitive disturbances. Mechanistic explanations of these relations sometimes involve language. To investigate the effect of hearing loss on behavioral deficits in the absence of language, we tested the impact of hearing loss in juvenile rats on motor, social, and cognitive behavior and on physiology of prefrontal cortex.

Processing of auditory information in forebrain regions after hearing loss in adulthood: Behavioral and electrophysiological studies in a rat model.

Background: Hearing loss was proposed as a factor affecting development of cognitive impairment in elderly. Deficits cannot be explained primarily by dysfunctional neuronal networks within the central auditory system. We here tested the impact of hearing loss in adult rats on motor, social, and cognitive function.