Grant: Team Grant: Vision, Hearing and Communication Disorders - LOI

Hearing loss leads to deficits in the perception of sounds that can be attributed directly to the impairment of the ear. However, resulting changes in the auditory parts of the brain produce perceptual anomalies such as tinnitus (ringing in the ears) and are likely to contribute to the difficulties that hearing impaired listeners have in understanding speech in background noise. Our team will combine physiological, anatomical, perceptual, and computational modeling studies to investigate the effects of hearing loss on neural connectivity and perception of sounds. The objectives of the research program are to understand the changes that occur at the different levels of the auditory pathways of the brain because of impairment in the ear and to ascertain whether observed changes in neural responses are due directly to the hearing loss in the ear or to changes in neural connectivity that have occurred within that level. A long-term goal of this line of research is to design hearing aid amplification schemes that better take into account the central effects of hearing loss, to help hearing aid users function better in difficult listening environments. In addition, the knowledge gained about brain plasticity in individuals with hearing loss will be utilized to develop treatment paradigms that help return the patterns of neural activity towards those of normal hearing and reduce the perception of tinnitus.