Effects of Asymmetries on Binaural-Hearing Abilities Across the Lifespan

NCT ID: NCT06953700

Last Updated: 2025-05-01

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: ENROLLING_BY_INVITATION
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 150 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2024-06-17
• Study Completion Date: 2026-05-31

Brief Summary

Binaural hearing involves combining auditory information across the ears. With binaural hearing, listeners benefit from perceiving sounds from different spatial locations. This is critical in solving the "cocktail party problem" (i.e., understanding speech in the presence of competing background sounds and noise). As humans get older, hearing loss increases, binaural abilities decrease, and the cocktail party problem becomes increasingly difficult. This research studies the mechanisms underlying the impact of age and hearing loss on speech-perception in noise and cocktail-party listening situations. More specifically, the role of hearing asymmetries between the ears is investigated. The specific aims are to generate an audiological and binaural-hearing-focused dataset for a large cohort of participants that vary in hearing asymmetry, age, and hearing loss and to use machine learning to uncover complex associations and generate novel hypotheses relating audiometric variables and basic binaural-hearing abilities to the cocktail-party problem. Participants in this research will complete perceptual measures of hearing acuity and spatial hearing. Participants will also report on speech understanding under noisy and challenging listening conditions. This research may lead to improvements in audiological care and hearing interventions.

Conditions

Aging; Hearing Loss; Hearing Asymmetry

Study Design

• Allocation Method: NA
• Intervention Model: SINGLE_GROUP
• Primary Study Purpose: BASIC_SCIENCE
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

Test of Hearing Function in Acoustic Hearing Listeners

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Test of hearing function

Intervention Type: DIAGNOSTIC_TEST

These are measurements of hearing acuity and spatial hearing.

Interventions

Test of hearing function

These are measurements of hearing acuity and spatial hearing.

Intervention Type: DIAGNOSTIC_TEST

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Adults (18-80 years)
• No hearing asymmetry between ears (≤10 dB at any frequency) or, hearing asymmetry between ears >10 dB
• Native English speakers
• Primarily use oral language
• Sufficient corrected or uncorrected visual acuity (20/50 or better) to read large-font text

Exclusion Criteria

• Acoustic tone-detection threshold >50 dB HL at any octave frequency (250-4000 Hz) in either ear (i.e., more than a moderate hearing loss)
• History of neurological disorders (e.g., stroke, Parkinson's disease) determined by self-report
• History of post-traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injury determined by self-report
• Possibility of acoustic neuroma, hearing asymmetry (>10 dB at three consecutive audiometric threshold frequencies)
• Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) score <22/30
• No oral language use
• Cochlear implant user
• Conductive hearing loss

• Minimum Eligible Age: 18 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 80 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD)

NIH

Sponsor Role: collaborator

University of Maryland, College Park

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Principal Investigators

Matthew J. Goupell, PhD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

University of Maryland, College Park

Michael P. Cummings, PhD

Role: STUDY_DIRECTOR

University of Maryland, College Park

Locations

University of Maryland, College Park

College Park, Maryland, United States

Countries

United States

Other Identifiers

1R21DC021825

Identifier Type: NIH

Identifier Source: secondary_id

View Link

1959852

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id