Hearing Study: Sensitivity to Features of Speech Sounds

May 9, 2025 updated by: Laurel Carney, University of Rochester

Auditory Processing of Complex Sounds - Sensitivity to Chirps

The purpose of this study is to better understand the sensitivity of listeners to the fast changes in frequency or amplitude of sounds that occur in speech. The investigators are studying ways to manipulate these aspects of sounds in an effort to make speech sounds more clear.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

The investigators will test listeners with normal hearing or with mild or moderate hearing loss. Tests will first focus on sensitivity to changes in fast changes in amplitude (loudness) or frequency (pitch) in sounds. Then the investigators will test the intelligibility of synthetic vowels and syllables in which these "chirps" are manipulated. Finally, the investigators will test intelligibility of words in noise while manipulating sounds in an effort to improve clarity.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

67

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • New York
      • Rochester, New York, United States, 14642
        • University of Rochester

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

18 years to 80 years (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Normal hearing, mild or moderate symmetric sensorineural hearing loss.

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Asymmetric hearing thresholds (more than 15 decibels (dB) threshold difference between the two ears at any frequency up to 4 kHz).
  • Severe hearing loss (greater than 60 dB hearing thresholds at any frequency up to 4 kHz).

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Basic Science
  • Allocation: Non-Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Active Comparator: Normal Hearing
Signal processing to improve intelligibility
Other: Signal processing to improve intelligibility
Signal processing will be used to manipulate frequency and amplitude fluctuations in complex sounds.
Active Comparator: Mild hearing loss
Signal processing to improve intelligibility
Other: Signal processing to improve intelligibility
Signal processing will be used to manipulate frequency and amplitude fluctuations in complex sounds.
Active Comparator: Moderate hearing loss
Signal processing to improve intelligibility
Other: Signal processing to improve intelligibility
Signal processing will be used to manipulate frequency and amplitude fluctuations in complex sounds.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Pure-tone Average Thresholds
Time Frame: 6 months
Hearing thresholds, average across test frequencies from 250 to 4000 Hz and averaged across the two ears.
6 months
F1 Discrimination Threshold
Time Frame: 6 months
Discrimination threshold for changes in F1, the low-frequency formant (spectral peak) in the synthetic vowel sounds.
6 months
F2 Discrimination Threshold
Time Frame: 6 month
Discrimination thresholds in % frequency for F2, the higher-frequency peak in synthetic vowel stimuli.
6 month

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
% of correct synthetic vowels
Time Frame: 5 years
% correct answers
5 years
% of correct synthetic syllables
Time Frame: 5 years
% correct answers
5 years
% of correct words
Time Frame: 5 years
% correct answers using SPiN test
5 years

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

University of Rochester

Collaborators

National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD)

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Laurel H Carney, PhD, University of Rochester

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

June 9, 2020

Primary Completion (Actual)

August 1, 2024

Study Completion (Actual)

August 1, 2024

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

September 8, 2018

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 8, 2018

First Posted (Actual)

September 12, 2018

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

May 29, 2025

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

May 9, 2025

Last Verified

May 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 73346
  • R01DC001641 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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