Elderly listeners’ multiple impairments and cognitive decline block isolating presbycusis components

Evidence

Age related hearing loss (presbycusis) makes it difficult to understand speech in noisy environments and multi-speaker environments (Moore 1995 ; Humes and Dubno 2010 ). There are several factors involved in presbycusis: loss of frequency selectivity, recruitment, and loss of temporal fine structure (Moore 2007 ). The isolation and measurement of these different aspects of hearing impairment (HI) in elderly listeners is not straightforward, partly because they often have multiple auditory problems, and partly because they may also have more central cognitive problems including depression. Together the problems make it difficult to obtain sufficient behavioral data to isolate different aspects of HI (Jerger et al. 1989 ; Lopez et al. 2003 ). We have developed a computational model of HI and an HI simulator that allow us to perform behavioural experiments on cochlear compression—experiments in which young normal hearing (NH) listeners act as “patients” with isolated, sensory-neural hearing losses of varying degree. The HI simulator is essentially a high-fidelity synthesizer based on the dynamic, compressive gammachirp filter bank (dcGC-FB) (Irino and Patterson 2006 ). It analyses naturally recorded speech sounds with a model of the auditory periphery that includes fast-acting compression and then resynthesizes the sounds in a form that counteracts the compression in a NH listener. They hear speech with little distortion or background noise (Irino et al. 2013 ) but without their normal compression. This makes it possible to investigate recruitment phenomenon that are closely related to loss of cochlear compression (Bacon et al. 2004 ) using NH listeners who have no other auditory problems. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 4046

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the HI simulator approach: using normal-hearing listeners as controlled ‘patients’ via resynthesis that strips cochlear compression.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 4046
• XREF: connects to: Listeners with hearing loss form a heterogeneous perceptual group, not a single category — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1092

Broader Connections

• Listeners with hearing loss form a heterogeneous perceptual group, not a single category #corroborates (0.75) — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1092