Abstract
Children with sensorineural hearing loss show considerable variability in spoken language outcomes. The present study tested whether specific deficits in supra-threshold auditory perception might contribute to this variability. In a previous study by Halliday, Rosen, Tuomainen, and Calcus [(2019). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 146, 4299], children with mild-to-moderate sensorineural hearing loss (MMHL) were shown to perform more poorly than those with normal hearing (NH) on measures designed to assess sensitivity to the temporal fine structure (TFS; the rapid oscillations in the amplitude of narrowband signals over short time intervals). However, they performed within normal limits on measures assessing sensitivity to the envelope (E; the slow fluctuations in the overall amplitude). Here, individual differences in unaided sensitivity to the TFS accounted for significant variance in the spoken language abilities of children with MMHL after controlling for nonverbal intelligence quotient, family history of language difficulties, and hearing loss severity. Aided sensitivity to the TFS and E cues was equally important for children with MMHL, whereas for children with NH, E cues were more important. These findings suggest that deficits in TFS perception may contribute to the variability in spoken language outcomes in children with sensorineural hearing loss.
Highlights
Auditory perception plays a fundamental role in language development
While the effect of group was not significant [b 1⁄4 À0.28, t(124.61) 1⁄4 À1.25, p 1⁄4 0.212], the effect of auditory processing was [b 1⁄4 0.77, t(84) 1⁄4 5.37, p < 0.001] as was the group  auditory processing interaction [b 1⁄4 À0.77, t(84) 1⁄4 À3.84, p < 0.001]. In both the unaided and aided conditions, independent sample t-tests (Welsh) confirmed that the interactions were due to the mildto-moderate hearing loss (MM) group obtaining higher thresholds on the temporal fine structure (TFS) composite relative to the controls {unaided, t(70.20) 1⁄4 À6.46, 95% confidence interval (CI) [À2.0,À1.1], p < 0.001, r 1⁄4 0.61; aided, t(66.24) 1⁄4 À4.46, 95% CI [À1.52,À0.58], p < 0.001, r 1⁄4 0.48}, but not on the E composite {unaided, t(82.43) 1⁄4 À1.33, 95% CI [À0.73,0.14], p 1⁄4 0.188, r 1⁄4 0.14; aided, t(80.60) 1⁄4 À1.32, 95% CI [À0.70,0.14], p 1⁄4 0.191, r 1⁄4 0.15}
As sensorineural hearing loss is associated with reduced sensitivity to TFS but not E cues (Buss et al, 2004; Hopkins and Moore, 2011; Lorenzi et al, 2006), it was hypothesised that TFS but not E sensitivity would be associated with the spoken language abilities of children with mild-to-moderate sensorineural hearing loss (MMHL)
Summary
The acoustic components of speech are known to convey important linguistic information. Like any complex auditory signal, speech signals are decomposed by the auditory system into an array of overlapping frequency bands. The envelope (E) comprises the slow oscillations (2–50 Hz) in the overall amplitude of a narrowband auditory signal and is evident in the acoustic properties of intensity, amplitude modulation (AM), and the rise (onset) and fall (offset) times of sounds (Rosen, 1992). Temporal fine structure (TFS) comprises the rapid oscilliations (0.6–10 kHz) in the amplitude of a narrowband signal over short time intervals (
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