İşitme Kaybı Olan Bireylerin Farklı Dinleme Koşullarındaki Eeg ve Erp Bulguları

Abstract

The task of listening in noisy environments is more difficult and effortful for especially in individuals with hearing loss. Listening effort is one of the important results of hearing loss that cannot be evaluated standard audiometric tests. Despite the importance of this issue, there is no reliable objective and electrophysiological method to evaluate listening effort. The aim of this study is to investigate the reflection of the listening effort hearing-impaired people on EEG and ERP's N1, P3, N4 components in different listening conditions. 12 individuals with normal hearing and 10 hearing-impaired people with bilateral mild to moderate sensorineural hearing loss were included in the study. During the EEG recording, the participants were presented Turkish Matrix sentences which is embedded on speech-shaped stationary noise with +3, 0, -3 and -6dB signal to noise ratio (SNR). EEG were recorded in 4 different blocks for +3, 0, -3 and -6dB SNR and in each block 60 sentences were presented which participant had to listen 240 sentences totally. According to our results, in the control group no statistically significant differences were observed in the amplitude and latency of N1, P3 and N4 responses in any of the listening conditions. However, when the amplitudes of N1 responses of the individuals in the study group were compared with +3 dB SNR and 0, -3 and -6 dB SNRs, statistically significant decreases were observed in the amplitudes of the N1 response (p<0,05). There was a statistically significant decrease in the amplitude of N4 responses in the study group when SNR decreased from +3 dB to 0 dB (p <0,05). Although it was clearly visible from the waveform that the amplitude of the P3 component increased as the listening task became more difficult, the difference did not reach statistical significance. In conclusion, it was thought that the amplitude measurements of N1 and N4 components from ERP responses could be useful to objectively evaluate the listening effort of hearing-impaired individuals in difficult listening conditions.