View clinical trials related to Hearing Loss.
Filter by:The purpose of this study is to examine and relate physiological, behavioral, and self-perceived changes after a period of hearing aid use and as a function of auditory training. The project will focus on the following questions: 1)Is experience-related behavioral change in hearing aid performance reflected as a neurophysiologic change? 2)Does a neurophysiologic change occur prior to or in conjunction with an experience-related behavioral change? 3) Does behavioral training modify the neurophysiologic representation of speech following the provision of hearing aids? 4)What is the relationship between physiologic, behavioral,and self-perceived change impacted by behavioral training? 5)Are neurophysiologic changes limited to trained stimuli or does auditory training alter neurophysiological responses?
The long-term goal of this research program is to develop methods to predict both the benefit and the satisfaction that hearing-impaired patients will derive from auditory amplification in daily life. This proposal has three primary objectives: (1) To determine the influence of extra-audiological variables, such as personality attributes and expectations, on the subjective outcomes of hearing aid fittings, (2) To establish a scientific basis for selection, administration, and interpretation of self-report measures of hearing aid fitting outcome, (3) To resolve the long-standing debate about the efficacy of using clinically measured loudness perception data in hearing aid prescriptions.
The effects of talker variability will be investigated with four groups of listeners (young normal-hearing; old normal-hearing; young hearing-impaired; old hearing-impaired). Experimental conditions will include between-talker differences, speaking rate, lexical difficult and semantic/linguistic context. A preliminary experiment will evaluate the relative merit of adaptive vs fixed-level methods of stimulus presentation.
This study will examine the hereditary basis of tone deafness by identifying regions of the human genome linked to this condition. Both exceptionally good pitch recognition (perfect pitch) and exceptionally poor pitch recognition (tone deafness) run in families. A better understanding of what causes tone deafness may provide new insights into auditory (hearing) function. Individuals with two or more family members 15 years of age or older who are tone deaf or have trouble recognizing different melodies may be eligible for this study. Candidates will be screened with a short listening test for pitch and a short written test. Those identified with poor pitch recognition will fill out a brief questionnaire about their family tree and family members (without identifying names) who have trouble recognizing melodies or tones. Individuals with poor pitch recognition will be asked to help contact family members who may be interested in participating. Members of families with two or more first-degree relatives (parents, grandparents, siblings) who are tone deaf may enroll in the study. They will provide a blood sample (about 2 tablespoons) for genetic studies and may take a 20-minute hearing test using headphones.