Louise Van Goylen

Purpose: In light of concerns about the traditional dual-task approach for behavioral listening effort, this study explored a novel dual-task interference (DTI)–based method in adults with and without hearing loss (HL). Method: Fifty-two normal-hearing individuals and 52 with HL were matched for age, sex, and education ( M age overall = 67.38 years). The dual-task paradigm combined a primary speech understanding task under five listening conditions with a secondary visual memory task. Dual-task effects (DTEs; performance change from baseline to dual-task) were calculated for both tasks. Linear mixed models assessed the effects of listening condition and hearing group on both DTEs. To explore individual task prioritization strategies, interference patterns were derived by plotting both DTEs, and Fisher's exact tests were used to examine associations between interference patterns and hearing groups across listening conditions. Results: Linear mixed models revealed significantly higher DTE values for the primary task at +4 dB SNR compared to +8 dB SNR, and higher secondary-task DTE values at 0 and −4 dB SNR compared to the other conditions. No significant effects of hearing group or interactions were found. Fisher's exact tests showed no significant group differences in DTI patterns. Conclusions: The DTI approach highlights individual DTI patterns, suggesting dynamic resource allocation and task prioritization under competing demands. These findings provide additional insight into the current use of dual-task paradigms for listening effort and support a broader interpretation of their role, including their potential for individualized counseling.

Purpose: The benefits of digital signal-processing features, such as noise reduction (NR) and frequency compression (FC), differ among individuals. This study aimed to explore the impact of deactivating NR and FC on hearing aid (HA) benefit, acknowledging the complexity of interindividual variability. Method: Thirty-two first-time HA users were assigned to three groups: a control group with no feature changes ( n = 10, mean age [MA] = 68.40 years), an NR-off group ( n = 11, MA = 65.82 years), and an FC-off group ( n = 11, MA = 66.82 years). Two test sessions were separated by about 4 weeks of acclimatization. Session 1 included baseline assessments (cognition, speech understanding, subjective measures) using initial HA settings, followed by immediate speech understanding reassessment after group allocation. In Session 2, speech understanding and subjective outcomes were reassessed. Wilcoxon signed-ranks and Kruskal–Wallis tests examined within-group and between-groups differences. Results: No significant effects of NR or FC on speech understanding or subjective measures were observed, but small trends emerged. Subjective improvements were most consistent in the control group. Tentative minor trends in subjective ratings suggested FC deactivation may be associated with declines in auditory–visual and psychosocial functioning and improvements in cognitive functioning, listening effort, and fatigue. Conclusions: Exploratory patterns suggest FC may impact subjective outcomes differently, despite no significant effects being found. The findings further critically reflect the complexity of evaluating cognition-related HA benefit and emphasize the need for multidimensional research to guide individualized HA fitting. Supplemental Material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.31141591

Introduction Understanding how listeners execute a dual-task paradigm for listening effort would provide a benchmark for future studies and clinical implementations. Therefore, this study aimed to examine the impact of instructions on the prioritization strategy employed by individuals during a dual-task paradigm for listening effort by assessing dual-task interference. Methods The dual-task paradigm consisted of a primary speech understanding task in different listening conditions and a secondary visual memory task, both performed separately (baseline) and simultaneously (dual-task). Twenty-three normal-hearing participants (mean age: 36.8 years; 14 females) were directed to prioritize the primary speech understanding task in the dual-task condition, whereas another twenty-three (matched for age, gender, and education level) received no specific instructions regarding task priority. Both groups performed the dual-task paradigm twice (mean interval: 14.8 days). Dual-task interference was assessed by plotting the dual-task effect of the primary and secondary task against each other. Participants were classified based on their patterns of interference. Results The prioritizing group had more participants who achieved stable or better scores on the primary task in the dual-task condition compared to baseline. However, there was considerable variability in the prioritizing strategy employed at the individual level across listening conditions and test moments, regardless the given prioritization instructions. Conclusion Providing prioritization instructions was insufficient to ensure that an individual will mainly focus on the primary task and will stick to this strategy across listening conditions and test moments. These results raised certain reservations about the current usage of dual-task paradigms for listening effort.