Subjective Listening Effort in Adult Cochlear Implant Users: Insights From the Listening Effort Questionnaire

This study aimed to assess the subjective listening effort in daily life situations of adult cochlear implant (CI) users in a clinical setting using a questionnaire designed for hearing aid (HA) users.

The listening effort of CI users with progressive sensorineural hearing loss was measured using the Listening Effort Questionnaire (LEQ). In addition, speech comprehension results and demographic data were recorded in order to statistically examine correlations with the LEQ results.

A total of 112 participants-unilateral CI users with bilateral deafness, bilateral CI users, unilateral CI users with single-sided deafness (SSD), and bimodal users (CI + HA)-were included in the study (M_age = 56.5 years, SD = 13.6). The median listening effort score (scale ranges from 0 = no effort to 10 = maximum effort) was 5.7 for situations affected by the signal-to-noise ratio, 6.6 for situations with low sound quality, and 3.8 for quiet situations with lipreading. The differences in listening effort between the three types of situations were significant. Speech comprehension in noise was associated with listening effort in noisy situations. In situations with low sound quality and quiet situations with lipreading, less listening effort was required by participants with SSD than by bilateral CI users and bimodal users.

The LEQ appears to be suitable for measuring adult CI users' subjective listening effort in daily life. The highest listening effort was experienced in situations with low sound quality, while the lowest effort was experienced in situations involving speech perception in quiet and lipreading.