Self-reported listening effort in adults with and without hearing loss: the Danish version of the Effort Assessment Scale (D-EAS).

PURPOSE: Hearing-impaired individuals experience higher levels of listening effort in challenging situations, affecting their communication in daily life. The purpose of this study was to linguistically and culturally adapt the Effort Assessment Scale (EAS) into Danish (D-EAS) and to investigate its reliability and validity in normal-hearing and hearing-impaired listeners. METHODS: The translation and cross-cultural adaptation of the EAS aligns with recommendations to adapt hearing-related questionnaires for different languages and cultures. Participants were 157 listeners (85 females) aged 20-86 years (Mage = 62.5, SD = 16.8), with (non-hearing aid and hearing aid users) and without hearing loss. RESULTS: Reliability analysis showed good internal consistency for the six items in the D-EAS (Cronbach's α= 0.93). Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses showed that D-EAS is a one-dimensional instrument. Significant differences were observed across items and overall scores between normal hearing (NH) and hearing loss groups. CONCLUSIONS: The D-EAS reliably estimates self-perception of listening effort in adults with and without hearing loss and is sensitive to the impact of hearing loss. Thus, the D-EAS can provide hearing care professionals and hearing researchers with valuable insights into people's self-perception of listening effort to help guide clinical and other rehabilitation decisions.Implications for RehabilitationThe Effort Assessment Scale (EAS) into Danish (D-EAS) is a reliable tool to estimate self-perception of listening effort in hearing-impaired adults.The D-EAS could be a helpful tool providing insights about aspects of hearing disability that is not commonly addressed with the traditional hearing assessments.The D-EAS can be incorporated in the hearing rehabilitation process as a tool for evaluating self-perception of listening effort in daily life situations.The D-EAS is easy to administer and requires a short time to answer, allowing its use by clinicians and hearing researchers in different settings.

Investigating the Effects of Four Auditory Profiles on Speech Recognition, Overall Quality, and Noise Annoyance With Simulated Hearing-Aid Processing Strategies.

Effective hearing aid (HA) rehabilitation requires personalization of the HA fitting parameters, but in current clinical practice only the gain prescription is typically individualized. To optimize the fitting process, advanced HA settings such as noise reduction and microphone directionality can also be tailored to individual hearing deficits. In two earlier studies, an auditory test battery and a data-driven approach that allow classifying hearing-impaired listeners into four auditory profiles were developed. Because these profiles were found to be characterized by markedly different hearing abilities, it was hypothesized that more tailored HA fittings would lead to better outcomes for such listeners. Here, we explored potential interactions between the four auditory profiles and HA outcome as assessed with three different measures (speech recognition, overall quality, and noise annoyance) and six HA processing strategies with various noise reduction, directionality, and compression settings. Using virtual acoustics, a realistic speech-in-noise environment was simulated. The stimuli were generated using a HA simulator and presented to 49 habitual HA users who had previously been profiled. The four auditory profiles differed clearly in terms of their mean aided speech reception thresholds, thereby implying different needs in terms of signal-to-noise ratio improvement. However, no clear interactions with the tested HA processing strategies were found. Overall, these findings suggest that the auditory profiles can capture some of the individual differences in HA processing needs and that further research is required to identify suitable HA solutions for them.