Noise Reduction Preferences in Teenagers and Pre-teens

Not Applicable

Completed

Conditions: Hearing Loss

Interventions: Device: Phonak Hearing Aid

Registration Number: NCT05372094

Lead Sponsor: Sonova AG

Brief Summary: Noise reduction preferences and blue tooth access to hearing aid streaming features will be evaluated in experienced hearing aid users age 10-17.

Detailed Description: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the preferences for hearing aid noise reduction settings in users age 10 -17, as well as to evaluate preferences for accessing the hearing aid Bluetooth streaming programs for this population. Subjective preferences will be obtained by having the participants listen to a noisy scene with different levels of noise reduction, to which they are blinded, and rate their preference. Blinded objective speech performance testing will be completed by a) finding the signal-to-noise ratio at which participant can correctly repeat back 50% of the target words, and b) measuring the percent of words correctly repeated during a noisy listening task. These tasks will be done using different levels of noise reduction. Subjective preferences for accessing Bluetooth streaming will also be obtained by asking participants which method they prefer (phone, hearing aid, or touch control).

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Recruitment & Eligibility

Status: COMPLETED

Sex: All

Target Recruitment: 18

Inclusion Criteria

mild, moderate, or moderate-severe bilateral sensorineural hearing loss
native English speakers with ability to communicate verbally
able to read and follow directions
access to smartphone and willing to download a hearing aid app
experienced hearing aid user (6+ months)

Exclusion Criteria

unable to follow verbal directions
unable to communicate verbally
unable to wear study devices for required home trials
active middle ear infection
unable to attend lab visits required for study

Study & Design

Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL

Study Design: SINGLE_GROUP

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Experimental	Phonak Hearing Aid	Participants will be fit with a commercially available hearing aid and tested using various strengths of the noise reduction feature.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Subjective Rating of Listening Effort Questionnaire	Day 14 of study, visit 2	Participant will rate perceived listening effort during a speech in noise task with different levels of noise reduction. Participants will rate how easy the task seemed using a sliding scale with 100 increments between two verbal anchors: "it was very easy" to "it was not easy at all". Higher scores indicate higher perceived listening effort. A rating of "0" would indicate "it was very easy" to understand the speech while a rating of "100" would indicate "it was not easy at all" to understand the speech.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Subjective Preference Questionnaire for Hearing Aid Noise Reduction Settings	Day 1 of study, visit 1	A blinded paired comparison between two different settings of noise reduction (NR), while listening to a story presented in noise. Participants indicate whether they prefer listening to setting "A" or setting "B". Investigator will switch the settings so that participant is not aware of what the settings are. There will be a total of 18 trials; 12 which will compare OFF to either WEAK or STRONG, and six trials will compare WEAK to STRONG. The preferred setting will be determined by counting which setting is chosen most often from those six trials. The outcome measure data will report a count of participants who preferred OFF to their chosen setting, who preferred their chosen setting to OFF, and those who chose OFF and their preferred setting an equal number of times.
Physical Response Time	Day 14 of study, visit 2	Length of time(in milliseconds) it takes participant to respond physically by pressing a button while also performing a verbal task. Participants repeat the word they hear, while at the same time, are instructed to press a button if the word they hear is an object "bigger than a basketball". A higher response time may indicate increased listening effort.
Subjective Questionnaire on Preference for Accessing Bluetooth on Phone	Day 28, visit 3	Subjective questionnaire about streaming access preferences. Participants will indicate which method (Hearing aid push button, phone control, or tap control on hearing aid) for answering phone calls and listening to audio streaming on phone.
Speech Reception Threshold	Day 28, visit 3	The signal to noise ratio in which participant can correctly repeat 50% of key words at different levels of noise reduction, known as SNR50. A lower number is better, as it indicates that the words do not have to be presented at a much higher level than the noise in order for the person to understand 50% of the words. For example, an SNR of 2 dB means that the words are 2 dB louder than the noise, and SNR of 0 dB means that the words and the noise are at the same level, etc.
Verbal Response Accuracy	Day 14 of study, visit 2	Out of 25 monosyllabic words presented in noise at different levels of noise reduction, the number of words the participant correctly repeats,while also performing a visual task. No statistical analysis was performed for this test.