Musicianship enhances hearing-in-noise performance in older and younger adults: Evidence from the Music-in-Noise Task

Hearing-in-noise (HIN) perception requires a complex interaction between sensory and cognitive functions. Older adults commonly report HIN difficulties, which contribute to social isolation, depression, and cognitive decline. Musical experience has emerged as a potential protective factor against age-related HIN deficits, with auditory working memory identified as a mediator. However, inconsistent findings regarding musicianship advantages persist, and research examining whether these benefits extend to older adults remains limited. In this study, we investigated the effects of musicianship on HIN perception in aging. We used a complex auditory task (i.e., the Music-in-Noise task) to isolate contributors, such as the use of predictive cues, auditory-visual integration and temporal processing. We compared 94 younger adults (YA; mean age = 23.6 years; age range: 18-28 years) and 90 older adults (OA; mean age = 69.59; age range: 60-86 years) with similar pure-tone hearing thresholds. We hypothesized that YA would outperform OA, particularly in conditions involving prediction and multimodal integration. We expected musicianship benefits across both age groups. Our results showed that YA performed better than OA on MINT conditions that offered additional cues (though equally on the baseline condition), and musical experience was associated with better performance. An earlier age of acquisition of musical experience was also correlated with better overall performance on the MINT. Our findings suggest that musical training enhances top-down cognitive mechanisms that support HIN perception, further promoting musical interventions to support successful auditory perception and social engagement across the lifespan.