Programm

Age-related hearing loss, a bilateral sensorineural impairment affecting higher frequencies, is highly prevalent among older populations. Its impact extends beyond mere difficulties in speech comprehension, leading to increased listening effort and a decrease in cognitive resources available for other domains. Moreover, hearing loss is one of the primary risk factors for developing tinnitus, the phantom perception of sound, mostly perceived as ringing “in the ear” without external stimulation. Emerging research suggests a potential link between tinnitus perception and cognitive impairments, alongside difficulties in speech comprehension.

Thus, unravelling the underlying neuro-cognitive mechanisms is crucial, alongside the development of effective intervention strategies and targeted training programs. In this symposium we intend to address these challenges with the aim to untangle the complex interplay of age-related hearing loss, tinnitus, cognitive functions, and speech perception, utilizing results from behavioral assessments, neuroimaging and intervention studies.

Lukas Rüttiger (Tübingen) will provide new insights in the role of stimulus onset contributions to speech comprehension that exist dependent and independent of aging and hearing loss. Julian Ockelmann (Zürich) will explore the potential benefits of auditory-cognitive training for treating speech comprehension deficits in older adults. Stephanie Rosemann (Oldenburg) will delve into the effects of chronic tinnitus, accompanied by hearing loss, on speech-in-noise perception and cognitive functions. Rodrigo Donoso-San Martin (Tübingen) will elucidate the relation of fast auditory processing deficits and cortical changes in tinnitus using for the first time the optical pumped magnetometer (OPM) MEG technology that promised new cortical resolution highly relevant for hearing research.