Can Dual Compression Offer Better Mandarin Speech Intelligibility and Sound Quality Than Fast-Acting Compression?
Yuan Chen, Lena L N Wong, Volker Kuehnel and 3 others
PMID 33710928WHAT IT FOUND
Dual compression hearing aids improved speech understanding in noise by 0.9 dB compared to fast-acting compression.
Users also preferred dual compression for comfort and clarity at +4 dB signal-to-noise ratio, though the small gain may not be noticeable to everyone.
Key findings
01Dual compression yielded significantly better sentence reception thresholds in noise than fast-acting compression, with a mean improvement of 0.9 dB.
02Participants slightly preferred dual compression over fast-acting compression for listening effort, comfort, clarity, and overall quality at +4 dB signal-to-noise ratio.
03There was no significant difference between the two compression settings for sentence recognition in quiet.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study did not compare dual compression to slow-acting compression, so it is unclear if the benefit comes from the slow component or the combination. The noise used was speech-spectrum-shaped, which may not reflect real-world fluctuating noises where fast-acting compression might have advantages. The study only tested Mandarin speakers, so results may not apply to other languages where consonants play a larger role in intelligibility. The improvement in speech recognition was small (0.9 dB) and may not be noticeable to all patients. Participants had extensive hearing aid experience (average 10.5 years), which may have influenced their preferences and performance.
Declared interests
Several authors are employees of Sonova AG, the manufacturer of the hearing aids used in the study. Sonova AG also provided financial support through a donation to the University of Hong Kong.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that dual compression will provide a large or obvious improvement in speech understanding for all patients. The measured benefit was small (0.9 dB) and may not be clinically noticeable to some listeners, particularly in quiet or very difficult noise conditions.