Journal of Phonetics & Audiology
Open Access

Abstract

How Age-Related Hearing Loss and Cognitive-Linguistic Processes Interact and Influence Free-Recall Memory Performance of Medical Instructions

Roberta M DiDonato and Aimée M Surprenant

This study investigated how age-related-hearing loss (ARHL) contributes to memory deficits and whether decreasing listening effort by enhancing the auditory-verbal message can facilitate memory performance. Recall of complex medical prescription instructions presented in degraded (65% time-compressed speech in babble in sound field) and enhanced (120% expanded speech in quiet with insertion earphones) listening conditions was compared for older adults with various configurations of hearing loss to younger adults without hearing loss. In addition, a third group of older musicians (‘expert listeners’) was included. Results demonstrated that enhancements of the auditoryverbal message during encoding facilitated memory at retrieval for all groups, but more so for the hearing-impaired older adult individuals. The older adult musicians showed additional enhancement in listening such that their memory performance was more similar to the younger non-musician than to a group of older adults matched for age and hearing ability. These findings support the effortful listening hypothesis. We propose that ARHL increases the processing load required to efficiently decode the message for communication at the perceptual, lexical and cognitive levels. These processing loads result in fewer attentional and cognitive-linguistic resources available for elaborate encoding for later recall. Enhancements to the auditory-verbal message in an ecologically valid task demonstrated that memory performance can be improved in older adults with hearing loss. These findings lend support to ARHL as a potential underlying causal mechanism contributing to declining memory performance in the aging adult population.