Effects of Aging and Hearing Loss During Rapid Sound Processing

快速声音处理过程中衰老和听力损失的影响

• 批准号: 8088914
• 负责人: Marilyn F. Dille
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: PORTLAND VA MEDICAL CENTER
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-01-01 至 2012-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/8088914
• 关键词: Accounting; Acoustics; Affect; Age; Age-Years; Aging; American; Attention; Auditory; Auditory system; Blinking; Cognition; Cognitive; Communication; Communication impairment; Complex; Comprehension; Detection; Development; Elderly; Emotional; Environment; Event; Failure; Frequencies; Health; Hearing; Hearing Aids; Hearing problem; Hour; Impairment; Individual; Investigation; Judgment; Literature; Memory; Modeling; National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders; Participant; Performance; Persons; Pilot Projects; Positioning Attribute; Probability; Process; Publishing; Quality of life; Randomized; Rehabilitation therapy; Reliance; Reporting; Research; Resources; Sensory; Short-Term Memory; Speech; Speech Perception; Stimulus; Stream; Testing; Time; United States; Veterans; Vision; Visual; age effect; aged; base; cost; experience; hearing impairment; human very old age (85+); improved; memory process; normal aging; rehabilitation strategy; research study; satisfaction; social; sound; visual process; visual processing

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The purpose of this pilot study is to understand how memory changes with aging and if failures of working memory during rapid sound processing may account for some of the speech perception difficulties reported by older Veteran listeners especially those with hearing loss. A period of processing interference (and limitation) has been identified during rapid auditory or visual processing, called the attentional blink (AB). Specifically, when subjects are asked to report on two targeted events embedded in a rapid stream of distractor events, the ability to report on the second target is diminished when it occurs at an interval of approximately 200-400ms following the first target, as if the person had blinked. This has been identified as a failure of working memory consolidation and is robust during both visual and auditory processing (Arnell, 2005). Much is known about how auditory AB affects young normal hearing listeners but little is known of its effect on older listeners or listeners with hearing loss. Since cognition and memory failures are common adjuncts of aging, a lengthened period of processing interference is very likely to be present among older listeners. This is important because speech is rapid and older listeners often report difficulty in complex auditory environments. Further, older listeners, who are more likely to have hearing loss, continue to report more problems hearing in noisy environments even with their hearing aids optimally functional. The presence of a prolonged period of processing interference in the auditory system could account for some of these complaints and, if more completely understood, could be remediated. Experiments used in this project are similar to published auditory AB studies (Vachon and Tremblay, 2005). Up to 72 subjects, ages 18-30 and 60-75 years will be invited to participate. Subjects will undergo a complete audiological evaluated done to assign them into one of four groups of 15 subjects each. Groups will be composed of young subjects with normal hearing (YNH), young subjects with no more than moderate hearing impairment (YHI), older subjects with normal hearing (ONH) and older subjects with no more than moderate hearing impairment (OHI). Each subject will be asked to listen to between 18 and 26 non-overlapping tones each 30ms in duration followed by a 60ms silent interval. Specifically, 26 distractor tones (between 452 and 3462 Hz) will be heard. T1 will be a 5000 Hz pure tone and T2 will be a complex tone composed of log-related frequencies (600, 775, 1002, 1295, 1674 Hz). The presentation rate of the tone stream will be 11.1/second (90ms stimulus onset asynchrony). Sequences could contain (in equal probability) a) no target, b) T1 only, c) T2 only or d) both targets. When T1 is presented it will occur as item 7-15, randomly assigned and, on no-T2 trials, is followed by 10 tones. When T2 is presented it could occupy any of eight post-T1 positions (lag 1 to 8) randomly selected or, when absent, is replaced by a distractor tone. At the end of each stream, the subject will be required to make an untimed judgment about whether the stream contained T1 (yes/no) and T2 (yes/no). 550 judgments will be obtained in 2 hours of testing. This project is self-paced. The hypothesized findings are that young listeners with or without hearing impairment will have more difficulty reporting on T2 when it follows T1 by approximately 200-400ms than at any other interval, consistent with a standard auditory AB. However, older listeners without hearing impairment will demonstrate a more prolonged period of interference (>400ms) with slightly poorer performance overall while older listeners with hearing impairment will have an even longer lasting period of processing interference and overall larger deficit (poorer performance) suggesting that increasing age and hearing impairment combine to increase the auditory AB for these participants. These results would provide a much-needed explanation of the ways in which rapid processing (precisely what speech is) is degraded by hearing impairment, aging, and a combination of the two. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Hearing loss is one of the most common health concerns affecting 1 in 3 Americans over 60 years of age rising to 1 in 2 for those over 85 years old. The VA issued nearly 476,000 hearing aids in 2009 at a cost of over $195.5M, reducing the impact that hearing impairment adds to social and emotional isolation. Contributions to hearing abilities provided by cognitive and memory processes are universally recognized as essential to adequate speech communication, but these processes are not well understood. Cognitive limitations in the ability to rapidly process sequential sounds occur with all listeners but may have more impact on older Veterans with and without hearing impairment. This is important since speech is rapid and sequential. If this processing limitation can be characterized more completely, it could eventually guide the development of real- world relevant tests and therapies, thereby extending the benefits of hearing aids for all Veterans.

描述（由申请人提供）： 这项试验研究的目的是了解记忆如何随老化的变化以及在快速声音处理过程中的工作记忆失败是否可能解释了年长的老将听众报告的某些语音感知困难，尤其是那些听力损失的人。在快速听觉或视觉处理期间已经确定了一个处理干扰（和限制）的时期，称为注意力眨眼（AB）。具体而言，当要求受试者报告嵌入在迅速的干扰事件中的两个目标事件时，在第一个目标之后以大约200-400毫秒的间隔发生，在第二个目标中报告的能力会降低，就像该人眨眼一样。这已被确定为工作记忆巩固的失败，并且在视觉和听觉处理过程中都很健壮（Arnell，2005年）。关于听觉AB如何影响年轻的正常听力听众的知识知之甚少，但对其对听力损失的老年听众或听众的影响鲜为人知。由于认知和记忆失败是衰老的常见辅助手段，因此在老年听众中很可能存在延长的处理干扰期。这很重要，因为语音很快，老年听众通常会在复杂的听觉环境中报告困难。此外，更可能有听力损失的年长听众，即使助听器最佳地发挥了噪音环境，他们仍会在嘈杂的环境中报告更多的听力。在听觉系统中处理长时间处理干扰的时间可以解释其中一些投诉，如果更完全理解的话，可以修复。 该项目中使用的实验类似于已发表的听觉AB研究（Vachon和Tremblay，2005年）。多达72名受试者将邀请18-30岁和60-75岁的受试者参加。受试者将经过一项完整的听力学评估，以将其分配为四个组的15个受试者之一。小组将由具有正常听力（YNH）的年轻受试者，无度听力障碍（YHI）的年轻受试者，正常听力（ONH）的较旧受试者以及不超过中度听力障碍的年长受试者（OHI）。将要求每个主题在持续时间内每30ms聆听18至26个非重叠的音调，然后聆听60ms的静音间隔。具体而言，将听到26种干扰物音调（452和3462 Hz之间）。 T1将是5000 Hz纯音，T2将是由与数对数相关的频率（600、775、1002、1295、1674 Hz）组成的复杂音调。音调流的表现率为11.1/秒（90ms刺激发作异步）。序列可以包含（同等概率）a）不靶标，b）仅c）仅c）T2或d）两个目标。当提出T1时，它将作为第7-15项，随机分配，在NO-T2试验中，然后是10个音调。当提出T2时，它可以占据随机选择的八个T1后位置（滞后1至8）中的任何一个，或者在不存在时被干扰器音调代替。在每个流的末尾，将要求对受试者对流是否包含T1（是/否）和T2（是/否）的不合时宜的判断。在测试的2小时内将获得550个判断。这个项目是自节奏的。假设的发现是，当T1遵循T2的年轻听众在T2上的报告大约200-400ms，而与其他任何间隔相比，与标准的听觉AB一致。但是，没有听力障碍的老年听众将表明长时间的干扰（> 400ms），总体表现稍差，而听力障碍的老年听众将持续更长的持续时间处理干扰和总体上更大的赤字（较差的表现）表明，增加了年龄和听力障碍，以增加这些参与者的听觉障碍。这些结果将提供急需的解释，即通过听力障碍，衰老和两者的组合来降低快速处理（确切的语音）方式。 公共卫生相关性： 听力损失是影响85岁以上的60岁以上3分之三分之一的最常见的健康问题之一。弗吉尼亚州在2009年发布了近476,000台助听器，耗资超过1.955亿美元，减少了听力障碍的影响，从而增加了社会和情感上的隔离。认知和记忆过程提供的听力能力的贡献被普遍认为是足够的语音交流所必需的，但是这些过程尚不清楚。所有听众都会出现快速处理顺序声音的能力的认知限制，但可能会对有和没有听力障碍的老年退伍军人产生更大的影响。这很重要，因为语音是快速和顺序的。如果可以更全面地表征这种处理限制，它最终可以指导相关测试和疗法的开发，从而扩大助听器对所有退伍军人的好处。