Our clinical concerns for children who are deaf or hard of hearing center on providing audible and comfortable access to sound. Our counterparts in speech-language pathology focus on developing receptive and expressive communication skills.
Although our field excels at helping children with hearing loss who use auditory technology (i.e., hearing aids and/or cochlear implants) acquire speech, language, and hearing skills, we do not necessarily shine in addressing how these children use their communication abilities in the real world.
Topic(s): Psychology, speech-language pathologist, Hearing Loss, Cochlear Implants (CI), speech production, speech intelligibility, language, speech-in-noise
The Problem
Most audiologists probably have encountered a patient who produces within- or among-test discrepancies in audiometric results that have no medical explanation. This phenomenon goes under a multiplicity of terms. In addition to pseudohypacusis, nonorganic hearing loss, and functional hearing loss, there are malingering, dis/simulating, faking, feigning, conversion, hysterical, psychogenic, and more.
Topic(s): false and exaggerated hearing loss (FEHL), Hearing Loss, Psychology, Audiogram, speech-in-noise, dysphonia, spastic dysphonia, spasmodic dysphonia
Hearing-care professionals (HCPs) and hearing aid wearers report the chief complaint secondary to hearing loss and to wearing traditional hearing aids, is the inability to understand speech-in-noise (SIN; see Beck et al, 2019). Beck et al (2018) reported that, in addition to the 37 million Americans with audiometric hearing loss, 26 million have hearing difficulty and/or difficulty understanding SIN, despite clinically normal thresholds. As such, helping people hear (i.e., to perceive sound) and helping people listen (i.e., to comprehend, or apply meaning to sound) remains paramount.
Topic(s): speech-in-noise, Hearing, Hearing Loss, Sensorineural Hearing Loss, Noise Reduction, Audiometric Test
