fNIRs, Listening Effort, and Speech Intelligibility

Not Applicable

• Conditions: Hearing Loss
• Interventions: Device: Hearing aids; Other: Unaided

• Registration Number: NCT05330585
• Lead Sponsor: Sonova AG

Brief Summary

The purpose of the current study is to measure oxygenation in the PFC using fNIRS in a sample of older adults with hearing loss. Adults with hearing loss will be asked to repeat the final word from low-context sentences in noise at two SNRs; a hard SNR (individually-measured SNR-50), and an easy SNR (SNR-50 + 10 dB) both without and with hearing aids set to a directional mode. The procedure will be a within-subject repeated measures. Stimuli will be randomized.

Detailed Description

See above.

Study Timeline

• Status Verified: 2022-03
• Study First Submitted: 2022-04-08
• Study First Submitted QC: 2022-04-08
• Study First Posted: 2022-04-15
• Study Start: 2022-05-03
• Last Update Submitted: 2022-09-12
• Last Update Posted: 2022-09-13
• Primary Completion: 2022-11
• Study Completion: 2022-12

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: UNKNOWN
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 30

Inclusion Criteria

• Adults (18-99 years) with ≥3 months hearing aid experience
• binaural, symmetric, sensorineural N2 (mild) to N6 (severe) hearing loss
• fluent in English

Exclusion Criteria

• children/teenagers
• normal hearing or hearing loss exceeding N6 (severe) by 10 dB

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: SINGLE_GROUP

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Participants with hearing loss.	Unaided	Participants with hearing loss.
Participants with hearing loss.	Hearing aids	Participants with hearing loss.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Speech-in-noise performance	Up to 2 hours during 1 session	Number of words repeatedly correctly for a given listening condition.
Listening effort	Up to 2 hours during 1 session	Listening effort inferred from infrared light scattered from the prefrontal cortex, which is indicative of concentration of oxygenated blood in that region. A higher concentration is indicative of more listening effort.

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Sonova Innovation Centre Toronto; 🇨🇦 Mississauga, Ontario, Canada