Audiological Correlates of Speech Understanding Deficits in Elderly Listeners with Mild-to-Moderate Hearing Loss. I. Age and Lateral Asymmetry Effects

Divenyi, Pierre L.; Haupt, Kara M.

doi:10.1097/00003446-199702000-00005

Cited by 100 publications

(86 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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“…In contrast to a 5 dB sensitivity hearing loss, a 5 dB HL in terms of S/B ratio is devastating and difficult to overcome. These disparate measures of speech recognition performance obtained in quiet and in background noise are found throughout the literature [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. The slopes of the functions at the 50 percent correct points were 6.5%/dB and 4.5%/dB, respectively.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Patients with hearing loss often complain that they can hear but cannot understand speech, especially in the presence of background noise [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11] Carhart and Tillman and later Plomp and Duquesnoy emphasized that listeners with peripheral sensorineural hearing loss are most handicapped when listening in the presence of background noise [2,12]. In routine clinical practice, the ability of patients to understand speech in a noisy environment is not typically assessed [13,14].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A word-recognition task in multitalker babble using a descending presentation mode from 24 dB to 0 dB signal to babble

Wilson¹,

Abrams²,

Pillion³

2003

JRRD

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Abstract-A speech-in-multitalker-babble test instrument was developed for use in a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) multicenter study examining the effects of hearing loss on selfperceived quality of life. Word recognition in quiet and in multitalker babble was measured on 24 listeners with normal hearing and 24 listeners with sensorineural hearing loss. The protocol involved the presentation of 10 monosyllabic words (each in a unique babble segment) at each of seven signal-tobabble (S/B) ratios from 24 dB to 0 dB, with the babble fixed at 60 dB HL (hearing loss). Word recognition in quiet at 60 dB and 80 dB HL for both groups was >90% correct. Two trials on the task were conducted. In babble, the 50% correct points were at 4.1 dB and 9.4 dB S/B for the listeners with normal hearing and hearing loss, respectively, with the 90th percentile for the listeners with normal hearing at 6 dB S/B. Twenty-two of the twenty-four listeners with hearing loss had 50% correct points outside of the 90th percentile for listeners with normal hearing. Test-retest reliability was excellent.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A word-recognition task in multitalker babble using a descending presentation mode from 24 dB to 0 dB signal to babble

Wilson¹,

Abrams²,

Pillion³

2003

JRRD

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…By controlling for hearing impairment statistically, Divenyi and Haupt (1997) and Divenyi et al (2005) were able to better differentiate between the effect of aging and the effects of hearing impairment; therefore, it is likely that the reduction in spatial processing ability that they report is actually attributable to age. It is worth noting that in the process of controlling for hearing impairment in their analysis, the researchers did conclude that greater degree of hearing impairment was also correlated with poorer spatial processing ability (Divenyi & Haupt, 1997). However, one could not say which effect of hearing impairment (whether it be loss of audibility, loss of frequency selectivity, or reduced temporal resolution) causes this decline.…”

Section: What Does Research Show About Spatial Processing and Aging?mentioning

confidence: 94%

Problems Hearing in Noise in Older Adults

Glyde

Hickson

Cameron

et al. 2011

Trends in Amplification

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Difficulty understanding speech in background noise, even with amplification to restore audibility, is a common problem for hearing-impaired individuals and is especially frequent in older adults. Despite the debilitating nature of the problem the cause is not yet completely clear. This review considers the role of spatial processing ability in understanding speech in noise, highlights the potential impact of disordered spatial processing, and attempts to establish if aging leads to reduced spatial processing ability. Evidence supporting and opposing the hypothesis that spatial processing is disordered among the aging population is presented. With a few notable exceptions, spatial processing ability was shown to be reduced in an older population in comparison to young adults, leading to poorer speech understanding in noise. However, it is argued that to conclude aging negatively effects spatial processing ability may be oversimplified or even premature given potentially confounding factors such as cognitive ability and hearing impairment. Further research is required to determine the effect of aging and hearing impairment on spatial processing and to investigate possible remediation options for spatial processing disorder.

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“…NIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript in central auditory and/or cognitive functioning also influence speech understanding, as performance of older adults with relatively normal pure-tone thresholds is often less than optimal (e.g., Divenyi & Haupt, 1997;Helfer & Wilber, 1990;Tun, O'Kane, & Wingfield, 2002).…”

Section: Nih-pa Author Manuscriptmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aging and Speech-on-Speech Masking

2008

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Objectives-A common complaint of many older adults is difficulty communicating in situations where they must focus on one talker in the presence of other people speaking. In listening environments containing multiple talkers, age-related changes may be caused by increased sensitivity to energetic masking, increased susceptibility to informational masking (e.g., confusion between the target voice and masking voices), and/or cognitive deficits. The purpose of the present study was to tease out these contributions to the difficulties that older adults experience in speech-on-speech masking situations.Design-Groups of younger, normal-hearing individuals and older adults with varying degrees of hearing sensitivity (n = 12 per group) participated in a study of sentence recognition in the presence of four types of maskers: a two-talker masker consisting of voices of the same sex as the target voice, a two-talker masker of voices of the opposite sex as the target, a signal-envelope-modulated noise derived from the two-talker complex, and a speech-shaped steady noise. Subjects also completed a voice discrimination task to determine the extent to which they were able to incidentally learn to tell apart the target voice from the same-sex masking voices and to examine whether this ability influenced speech-on-speech masking.Results-Results showed that older adults had significantly poorer performance in the presence of all four types of maskers, with the largest absolute difference for the same-sex masking condition. When the data were analyzed in terms of relative group differences (i.e., adjusting for absolute performance) the greatest effect was found for the opposite-sex masker. Degree of hearing loss was significantly related to performance in several listening conditions. Some older subjects demonstrated a reduced ability to discriminate between the masking and target voices; performance on this task was not related to speech recognition ability.Conclusions-The overall pattern of results suggests that although amount of informational masking does not seem to differ between older and younger listeners, older adults (particularly those with hearing loss) evidence a deficit in the ability to selectively attend to a target voice, even when the masking voices are from talkers of the opposite sex. Possible explanations for these findings include problems understanding speech in the presence of a masker with temporal and spectral fluctuations and/or age-related changes in cognitive function.The primary auditory complaint of many older people is difficulty understanding speech in noisy situations. Numerous studies have documented this age-related decline in the ability to comprehend speech in the presence of a masker (e.g., Dubno, Dirks, & Shaefer, 1987;Plomp & Mimpen 1979). This research has demonstrated that older adults with presbycusis generally have greater difficulty understanding masked speech than do young, normal-hearing individuals. Although a portion of this problem is because of the filtering and distortio...

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Audiological Correlates of Speech Understanding Deficits in Elderly Listeners with Mild-to-Moderate Hearing Loss. I. Age and Lateral Asymmetry Effects

Cited by 100 publications

References 71 publications

A word-recognition task in multitalker babble using a descending presentation mode from 24 dB to 0 dB signal to babble

A word-recognition task in multitalker babble using a descending presentation mode from 24 dB to 0 dB signal to babble

Problems Hearing in Noise in Older Adults

Aging and Speech-on-Speech Masking

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