Effectiveness of Television Streaming on Hearing Aid User Performance and Satisfaction in Quiet and in Noise

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of television (TV) streaming on hearing aid user performance and satisfaction in quiet and in noise.

Twenty experienced hearing aid users were evaluated in quiet and in noise (5 dB SNR) under three hearing aid conditions: hearing aids, streaming with hearing aid microphones attenuated by 6 dB, and streaming with hearing aid microphones muted. The audiovisual Connected Speech Test served as the signal, and the ipsilateral competing message from the Synthetic Sentence Identification-Ipsilateral Competing Message (SSI-ICM) served as the noise. Measures of speech understanding, satisfaction with sound quality and clarity, and preference were obtained.

Speech understanding was significantly better in quiet than in noise, and streaming improved performance in noise when the hearing aid microphones were muted. Sound quality satisfaction was significantly better in quiet than in noise but was not impacted significantly by the hearing aid settings. Speech clarity satisfaction was significantly better in quiet than in noise, and streaming improved satisfaction in noise when the hearing aid microphones were muted. More participants preferred streaming with the microphones muted in quiet, in noise, and overall; however, results did not reach statistical significance.

Hearing aid users did not benefit from TV streaming with the microphones attenuated or muted when listening in quiet. TV streaming was more beneficial to hearing aid users when listening in noise with the microphones muted. Hearing aid users should be counseled on the impact of the hearing aid microphone settings when using a TV streamer, particularly in noise.