Age-group differences in speech identification despite matched audiometrically normal hearing: contributions from
Christian Füllgrabe1, Brian C J Moore2, Michael A Stone3
1MRC Institute of Hearing Research Nottingham, UK.
Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience
|January 29, 2015
Summary
Aging impairs speech understanding in older adults with normal hearing, not just due to audibility but also cognitive and temporal processing declines. These factors significantly impact speech-in-noise (SiN) intelligibility.
Area of Science:
- Audiology
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Psychology
Background:
- Age-related hearing loss negatively impacts speech comprehension, partly due to reduced audibility.
- It remains unclear if normal-hearing older adults experience reduced speech intelligibility and the underlying auditory and cognitive mechanisms.
- This study investigates age-related changes in speech perception beyond audibility.
Purpose of the Study:
- To determine if aging reduces speech intelligibility in normal-hearing listeners.
- To assess the roles of auditory temporal processing and cognitive function in age-related speech perception decline.
- To identify predictors of speech-in-noise (SiN) intelligibility in older adults.
Main Methods:
- Compared speech identification in quiet and noise for older normal-hearing (ONH) and young normal-hearing (YNH) adults.
- Assessed sensitivity to temporal envelope (TE) and temporal fine structure (TFS) modulation.
- Evaluated cognitive abilities and their correlation with speech perception.
- Measured modulation masking release and spatial masking release.
Main Results:
- ONH participants performed worse than YNH on speech identification tasks in all background conditions.
- Age did not affect modulation or spatial masking release.
- ONH participants showed reduced sensitivity to TE and TFS, which correlated with SiN identification.
- Cognitive abilities were lower in ONH participants and correlated with SiN identification.
Conclusions:
- Speech perception declines in older adults with normal hearing are partly attributable to cognitive and perceptual changes, not solely audibility.
- Temporal processing (TE and TFS sensitivity) and cognitive function are key predictors of SiN intelligibility.
- These findings highlight the complex interplay of factors affecting speech understanding in aging individuals.
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