Phonemic restoration in sensorineural hearing loss does not depend on baseline speech perception scores

The brain can restore missing speech segments using linguistic knowledge and context. The phonemic restoration effect is commonly quantified by the increase in intelligibility of interrupted speech when the silent gaps are filled with noise bursts. In normal hearing, the restoration effect is negatively correlated with the baseline scores with interrupted speech; listeners with poorer baseline show more benefit from restoration. Reanalyzing data from Başkent et al. [(2010). Hear. Res. 260, 54-62], correlations with mild and moderate hearing impairment were observed to differ than with normal hearing. This analysis further shows that hearing impairment may affect top-down restoration of speech.