A Step Toward Precision Audiology: Individual Differences and Characteristic Profiles From Auditory Perceptual and Cognitive Abilities.
Dana Cherri, David A Eddins, Erol J Ozmeral
PMID 39099537WHAT IT FOUND
Older adults with similar audiogram thresholds formed different listening profiles, including poorer spatial hearing or working memory.
A person who struggles in noise may have a specific deficit the audiogram does not reveal.
Key findings
01Forty older adults formed five profiles when normal-hearing and hearing-loss groups were combined, and three profiles within each group separately.
02In the normal-hearing group, three profiles differed on spatial hearing, backward working memory, dichotic frequency modulation, and tone-in-noise thresholds, while pure tone averages did not differ.
03In the hearing-loss group, three profiles differed on noise tolerance, spatial hearing, fluid intelligence, and working memory, while pure tone averages did not differ.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
Only 20 people were in each hearing group, so the profiles may not hold in a larger clinic population. Some clusters contained 1 or 2 people and were excluded, so other profiles may exist. The clustering method is sensitive to the chosen number of clusters and the starting point of clusters, so a different method could give a different profile structure. The study did not test whether profile-based hearing aid fitting or auditory training improves speech understanding. The study did not measure effort, motivation, or tiredness, which could affect test performance.
Declared interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest. The work was supported by NIH grants R01DC015051 and R21DC017832.
The easy way to misread this
Do not treat these profiles as a validated clinical test or as proof that tailored hearing aid settings or auditory training work. The paper grouped 40 older adults by laboratory performance and did not assign patients to profile-based treatment.