Abstract
(1) Background: Research has demonstrated that early intervention for children who are hard-of-hearing (CHH) facilitates improved language development. Early speech perception abilities may impact CHH outcomes and guide future intervention. The objective of this study was to examine the use of a conditioned head turn (CHT) task as a measure of speech discrimination in CHH using a clinically feasible protocol. (2) Methods: Speech perception was assessed for a consonant and vowel contrast among 57 CHH and 70 children with normal hearing (CNH) aged 5–17 months using a CHT paradigm. (3) Results: Regardless of hearing status, 74% of CHH and 77% of CNH could discriminate /a-i/, and 55% of CHH and 56% of CNH could discriminate /ba-da/. Regression models revealed that both CHH and CNH performed better on /ba-da/ at 70 dBA compared to 50 dBA. Performance by hearing age showed no speech perception differences for CNH and children with mild hearing loss for either contrast. However, children with hearing losses ≥ 41 dB HL performed significantly poorer than CNH for /a-i/. (4) Conclusions: This study demonstrates the clinical feasibility of assessing early speech perception in infants with hearing loss and replicates previous findings of speech perception abilities among CHH and CNH.
Highlights
Accepted: 28 September 2021This is a study about behavioral speech perception among hard-of-hearing infants whose hearing losses were identified through universal newborn hearing screenings
While Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) programs have led to significant improvements in language outcomes, much remains unknown about early speech perception abilities in young infants with hearing loss or how such abilities contribute to language outcomes compared to their normal hearing peers [1]
children who are hard-of-hearing (CHH) and children with normal hearing (CNH) had higher scores on the /ba-da/ contrast at 70 dBA compared to 50 dBA; the same benefit was observed for the CHH when analyzed as a separate cohort
Summary
This is a study about behavioral speech perception among hard-of-hearing infants whose hearing losses were identified through universal newborn hearing screenings. Early identification and treatment services have resulted in receptive and expressive language skills similar to children with normal hearing (CNH) [8,9,10]. Despite these improvements, there continues to be wide variability in spoken language outcomes (i.e., mean vocabulary quotient = 77.6, SD = 19.7; [11]), word learning abilities [12], and academic achievement [13,14,15] for CHH.
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