Second cause of hidden hearing loss identified

Patients who complain they can't hear their friends at a noisy restaurant, but pass a hearing test in their doctor's office, may be describing hidden hearing loss.

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Second cause of hidden hearing loss identified

Patients who complain they can't hear their friends at a noisy restaurant, but pass a hearing test in their doctor's office, may be describing hidden hearing loss.

from #Audiology via xlomafota13 on Inoreader http://ift.tt/2kU2zlu
via IFTTT

Second cause of hidden hearing loss identified

Patients who complain they can't hear their friends at a noisy restaurant, but pass a hearing test in their doctor's office, may be describing hidden hearing loss.

from #Audiology via ola Kala on Inoreader http://ift.tt/2kU2zlu
via IFTTT

New Cures For Tinnitus

Tinnitus is a frustrating and often debilitating condition in which you perceive sounds within your ears. These sounds are only heard by you and can interfere with your hearing, your ability to carry on a conversation and your capability to concentrate at work or school. Fortunately, medical researchers and doctors are looking for new cures for tinnitus and are achieving some successes in developing helpful treatment options.

Hormone Therapy
One of the new cures for tinnitus involves a hormone therapy. Small doses of the hormone misoprostol have been found to reduce the volume of tinnitus. Misoprostol is taken orally as a tablet. Most people take one tablet once per day as directed by their doctor. This medication has minimal side effects and is usually effective at reducing the volume of tinnitus within a few days of starting the treatment. Steroid treatments can also be used for reducing tinnitus. Steroids are hormones that are effective in tiny doses. A steroid drop can be placed into your middle ear to reduce swelling and inflammation that may be causing the tinnitus.

Anti-anxiety and Anti-depressant Medications
There is ongoing research into new cures for tinnitus that are based upon anti-anxiety and anti-depressant medications. These medications change the way that your brain responds to certain chemicals, such as dopamine. A low dose of a well-recognized anti-anxiety medication such as Valium or the anti-depressant Elavil can be taken orally, once per day. These medications are thought to relieve tinnitus symptoms by changing how your brain’s neurons absorb and release hormones and other natural substances.

Masking Devices
There is much research into the use of masking devices and tinnitus instruments. Masking devices are used as a way to provide your brain with other auditory stimulation. The white noise delivered by a masking device results in a process called habituation. Your tinnitus frequency becomes a part of the white noise so your brain tunes out the entire sound and the tinnitus does not bother you as much. These instruments can fit into your ear canal like a hearing aid.

Auditory Therapy
You can also listen to matched frequency sounds as a type of tinnitus therapy that is free of side effects. Tinnitus retraining therapy also helps your brain to habituate to the sound and reduce its importance. It works in a similar way as the process that allows your brain to tune out common sounds such as traffic or fans.

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Tone Attrition in Mandarin Speakers of Varying English Proficiency

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the degree of dominance of Mandarin–English bilinguals' languages affects phonetic processing of tone content in their native language, Mandarin.

Method

We tested 72 Mandarin–English bilingual college students with a range of language-dominance profiles in the 2 languages and ages of acquisition of English. Participants viewed 2 photographs at a time while hearing a familiar Mandarin word referring to 1 photograph. The names of the 2 photographs diverged in tone, vowels, or both. Word recognition was evaluated using clicking accuracy, reaction times, and an online recognition measure (gaze) and was compared in the 3 conditions.

Results

Relative proficiency in English was correlated with reduced word recognition success in tone-disambiguated trials, but not in vowel-disambiguated trials, across all 3 dependent measures. This selective attrition for tone content emerged even though all bilinguals had learned Mandarin from birth. Lengthy experience with English thus weakened tone use.

Conclusions

This finding has implications for the question of the extent to which bilinguals' 2 phonetic systems interact. It suggests that bilinguals may not process pitch information language-specifically and that processing strategies from the dominant language may affect phonetic processing in the nondominant language—even when the latter was learned natively.

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Influence of Left–Right Asymmetries on Voice Quality in Simulated Paramedian Vocal Fold Paralysis

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to determine the vocal fold structural and vibratory symmetries that are important to vocal function and voice quality in a simulated paramedian vocal fold paralysis.

Method

A computational kinematic speech production model was used to simulate an exemplar “voice” on the basis of asymmetric settings of parameters controlling glottal configuration. These parameters were then altered individually to determine their effect on maximum flow declination rate, spectral slope, cepstral peak prominence, harmonics-to-noise ratio, and perceived voice quality.

Results

Asymmetry of each of the 5 vocal fold parameters influenced vocal function and voice quality; measured change was greatest for adduction and bulging. Increasing the symmetry of all parameters improved voice, and the best voice occurred with overcorrection of adduction, followed by bulging, nodal point ratio, starting phase, and amplitude of vibration.

Conclusions

Although vocal process adduction and edge bulging asymmetries are most influential in voice quality for simulated vocal fold motion impairment, amplitude of vibration and starting phase asymmetries are also perceptually important. These findings are consistent with the current surgical approach to vocal fold motion impairment, where goals include medializing the vocal process and straightening concave edges. The results also explain many of the residual postoperative voice limitations.

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A Comparative Study of the Precision of Carstens and Northern Digital Instruments Electromagnetic Articulographs

Purpose

This study compares the precision of the electromagnetic articulographs used in speech research: Northern Digital Instruments' Wave and Carstens' AG200, AG500, and AG501 systems.

Method

The fluctuation of distances between 3 pairs of sensors attached to a manually rotated device that can position them inside the measurement volumes was determined. For each device, 2 precision estimates made on the basis of the 95% quantile range of these distances (QR95) were defined: The local QR95 was computed for bins around specific rotation angles, and the global QR95 was computed for all angles pooled.

Results

For all devices, although the local precision lies around 0.1 cm, the global precision is much more worrisome, ranging from 0.03 cm to 2.18 cm, and displays large variations as a function of the position of the sensors in the measurement volume. No influence of the rotational speed was found. The AG501 produced—by far—the lowest errors, in particular concerning the global precision.

Conclusions

The local precision can be considered suitable for speech articulatory measurements, but the variations of the global precision need to be taken into account by the knowledge of the spatial distribution of errors. A guideline for good practice in EMA recording is proposed for each system.

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