Easy as 1-2-3: Development and Evaluation of a Simple yet Valid Audiogram-Classification System.

Almost since the inception of the modern-day electroacoustic audiometer a century ago the results of pure-tone audiometry have been characterized by an audiogram. For almost as many years, clinicians and researchers have sought ways to distill the volume and complexity of information on the audiogram. Commonly used approaches have made use of pure-tone averages (PTAs) for various frequency ranges with the PTA for 500, 1000, 2000 and 4000 Hz (PTA4) being the most widely used for the categorization of hearing loss severity.

Demographic and Audiological Characteristics of Candidates for Over-the-Counter Hearing Aids in the United States.

Objectives: This report presents descriptive data on the demographic and audiological characteristics of US adults with perceived mild-to-moderate hearing loss, the primary candidates for over-the-counter (OTC) hearing aids.

Design: The analyses are descriptive and present population-weighted responses for various self-reported demographic and audiological variables for adults with mild or moderate perceived hearing trouble. Results of pure-tone audiometry and immittance measures are also presented.

Otoscopic Abnormalities for the U.S. Population Aged 6-80+ Years: Prevalence and Consequences for Hearing.

Purpose: U.S. national data for otoscopic examinations of 13,055 individuals aged 6-80+ years included in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey surveys for 2011-2012, 2015-2016, and 2017-2020 were analyzed and described.

Hearing thresholds for "otologically normal" adults from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys 2011-12 and 2015-16.

Hearing threshold levels (HTLs) get worse with advancing age in adults. Publications of nationally representative data from U.S.

U.S. Population Data on Hearing Loss, Trouble Hearing, and Hearing-Device Use in Adults: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2011-12, 2015-16, and 2017-20.

The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data on audiometric hearing loss, self-reported trouble hearing, and the use of hearing aids and assistive listening devices (ALDs) for the three most recent surveys (2011-12, 2015-16, and 2017-20) were analyzed for adults ranging in age from 20 to 80-plus years. Complete audiograms were available for a total of 8,795 adults. The prevalence of hearing loss, measured audiometrically and self-reported, is provided for males and females by age decade.

U.S. Population Data on Self-Reported Trouble Hearing and Hearing-Aid Use in Adults: National Health Interview Survey, 2007-2018.

The National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) data on self-reported trouble hearing and the use of hearing aids were examined for the 12 recent surveys from 2007 to 2018 for adults from 18 to 85+ years of age. The aggregate dataset for all years included data from 357,714 adult respondents. Sample size for annual data ranged from 22,058 (2008) to 36,798 (2014).

Hearing Thresholds for Unscreened U.S. Adults: Data From the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2011-2012, 2015-2016, and 2017-2020.

Hearing threshold levels (HTLs) at 500-8,000 Hz from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2011-2012, 2015-2016, and 2017-2020 were analyzed for males and females ranging in age from 20 to 80-plus years ( = 8,795). HTLs for the 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th percentiles are provided for males and females. Equations were generated to describe median HTLs as a function of age at each frequency.

Estimation of all-cause noise exposure for U.S. adults from national survey data.

Millions of adults are at risk of hearing loss resulting from exposure to occupational and recreational noises. Data from the combined National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2011-2012 and 2015-2016 datasets were used to establish the prevalence of occupational and recreational noise exposures through self-report questions. For recreational noise exposures, NHANES asked about the use of firearms, including the use of hearing protection devices (HPDs) while shooting, and off-work exposures to very loud noise.

Modification of a Method for Diagnosing Noise-Induced Hearing Loss Sustained During Military Service.

Moore (2020) proposed a method for diagnosing noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) sustained during military service, based on an analysis of the shapes of the audiograms of military personnel. The method, denoted M-NIHL, was estimated to have high sensitivity but low-to-moderate specificity. Here, a revised version of the method, denoted rM-NIHL, was developed that gave a better balance between sensitivity and specificity.

Sex-Linked Biology and Gender-Related Research Is Essential to Advancing Hearing Health.

There is robust evidence that sex (biological) and gender (behavioral/social) differences influence hearing loss risk and outcomes. These differences are noted for animals and humans-in the occurrence of hearing loss, hearing loss progression, and response to interventions. Nevertheless, many studies have not reported or disaggregated data by sex or gender.

Differences Between Young and Older Adults in Working Memory and Performance on the Test of Basic Auditory Capabilities.

The Test of Basic Auditory Capabilities (TBAC) is a battery of auditory-discrimination tasks and speech-identification tasks that has been normed on several hundred young normal-hearing adults. Previous research with the TBAC suggested that cognitive function may impact the performance of older adults. Here, we examined differences in performance on several TBAC tasks between a group of 34 young adults with a mean age of 22.

Differences in Auditory Perception Between Young and Older Adults When Controlling for Differences in Hearing Loss and Cognition.

This study was designed to examine age effects on various auditory perceptual skills using a large group of listeners (155 adults, 121 aged 60-88 years and 34 aged 18-30 years), while controlling for the factors of hearing loss and working memory (WM). All subjects completed 3 measures of WM, 7 psychoacoustic tasks (24 conditions) and a hearing assessment. Psychophysical measures were selected to tap phenomena thought to be mediated by higher-level auditory function and included modulation detection, modulation detection interference, informational masking (IM), masking level difference (MLD), anisochrony detection, harmonic mistuning, and stream segregation.

Predictive Sentence Context Reduces Listening Effort in Older Adults With and Without Hearing Loss and With High and Low Working Memory Capacity.

Objectives: Listening effort is needed to understand speech that is degraded by hearing loss, a noisy environment, or both. This in turn reduces cognitive spare capacity, the amount of cognitive resources available for allocation to concurrent tasks. Predictive sentence context enables older listeners to perceive speech more accurately, but how does contextual information affect older adults' listening effort? The current study examines the impacts of sentence context and cognitive (memory) load on sequential dual-task behavioral performance in older adults.

A Comparison of the Perceived Hearing Difficulties of Community and Clinical Samples of Older Adults.

Purpose This study aimed to compare the perceived hearing difficulties of a community sample of older adults to two clinical samples of older adults, one with no hearing aid experience and the other with hearing aid experience. Method Scale scores from the Communication Profile for the Hearing Impaired (CPHI) were analyzed for a community sample of older adults ( = 243) and compared to scores from two clinical samples, one without ( = 342) and one with prior hearing-aid experience ( = 179). General linear model (GLM) analyses were performed to examine the effects of data sample type and other factors on CPHI scale scores.

Factors Underlying Individual Differences in Speech-Recognition Threshold (SRT) in Noise Among Older Adults.

Many older adults have difficulty understanding speech in noisy backgrounds. In this study, we examined peripheral auditory, higher-level auditory, and cognitive factors that may contribute to such difficulties. A convenience sample of 137 volunteer older adults, 90 women, and 47 men, ranging in age from 47 to 94 years ( = 69.

Development of the SWB-HL: A Scale of the Subjective Well-Being of Older Adults With Hearing Loss.

The objective of this research was to develop and evaluate a self-report measure of subjective well-being (SWB) for use with older adults with hearing loss (HL). A convenience sample of 173 local volunteers between the ages of 60 and 88 years ( = 74.4; SD = 7.

Differences Between Older Adults Who Do and Do Not Try Hearing Aids and Between Those Who Keep and Return the Devices.

The focus of this study was on the differences between older adults who complied with a clinical recommendation for hearing-aid acquisition (adherents;  = 105) and those who did not (nonadherents;  = 34) among a group of research volunteers from the community. All participants were first-time hearing-aid users. Differences between adherents and nonadherents were examined across several domains, including demographic variables, audiometric measures, measures of affect and personality, cognitive variables, hearing-aid expectations, and the perceived hearing difficulties of the older adults and their adjustments to those difficulties.

Further Evaluation and Application of the Wisconsin Age-Related Hearing Impairment Classification System.

Purpose The primary purpose of this report is to further evaluate the Wisconsin Age-Related Hearing Impairment Classification System (WARHICS) scheme for the classification of audiograms obtained from older adults, ages 50-89 years. Method This was a retrospective analysis of data from 11,729 older adults included in two population, one community, and two clinical data sets. To aid in the interpretation of the audiogram classifications, the functional significance of audiogram categories was evaluated using Hearing Handicap Inventory-Screen scores available for 10,330 of these same individuals.

Longitudinal Changes in Auditory and Cognitive Function in Middle-Aged and Older Adults.

Purpose This article aimed to document longitudinal changes in auditory function, including measures of temporal processing, and to examine the associations between observed changes in auditory and cognitive function in middle-aged and older adults. Method This was a prospective longitudinal study of 98 adults (66 women) with baseline ages ranging from 40 to 85 years. The mean interval between T1 baseline and T2 follow-up measurements was 8.

Associations Between Measures of Auditory Function and Brief Assessments of Cognition.

Purpose The two primary purposes of this report are (a) to compare the results of three brief cognitive screens in older adults and (b) to examine associations between performance on each of the screens and auditory function measured either concurrently or 9 years earlier. Method This was a prospective longitudinal study of 98 adults (66 women) with baseline ages ranging from 40 to 85 years. The mean interval between T1 baseline and T2 follow-up measurements was 8.

Introduction to the Special Issue: Select Papers From the Hearing Across the Lifespan (HEAL) 2018 Conference.

[Figure: see text].

Examining the Validity of the World Health Organization's Long-Standing Hearing Impairment Grading System for Unaided Communication in Age-Related Hearing Loss.

Objective This review article overviews a presentation at the Hearing Across the Lifespan 2018 Conference, which examined the data from 5 data sets having pure-tone thresholds and functional measures of speech communication from relatively large groups of older adults to evaluate the validity of the long-standing World Health Organization (WHO) hearing impairment (HI) grading system. Design This was a review of studies identified from the literature having both pure-tone audiometry and functional measures of speech communication from relatively large samples of older adults. Study sample Three population or population-sample data sets and 2 clinical data sets were identified and included in the review.