Noise-induced hearing loss reduces neural suppression in proportion to tuning broadening

Evidence

We found a small decrease in suppression in HI fibers, which correlated with broadened tuning. These data will help guide novel amplification strategies, particularly for complex listening situations (e.g., speech in noise), in which current hearing aids struggle to restore intelligibility. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3812

Hearing-impaired (HI) animals had elevated single-fiber excitatory thresholds (by ~ 20–40 dB), broadened frequency tuning, and reduced-magnitude distortion-product otoacoustic emissions; consistent with mixed innerand outer-hair-cell pathology. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3812

Categorization

• XREF: Links cochlear damage physiology directly to why hearing-aid multichannel compression struggles with speech in noise — connects to auditory amplification literature and psychoacoustic speech-in-noise deficits.
• SEED: Angle: hearing aids compress the wrong thing — restoring gain but not the suppressive nonlinear interactions that speech-in-noise coding actually depends on.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3812