One of the most pervasive effects of aging is the reduction in processing speed, affecting sensory, cognitive, and motor systems. The effects of aging on temporal processing likely play a role in the older adult’s difficulty understanding speech in challenging listening environments. So what options can a clinician offer an older patient who continues to struggle with hearing after being fit with amplification? Research has demonstrated that both short-term auditory training and lifelong experience can not only lead to better hearing in noise, but also fundamentally alter the brain’s representation of speech and other sounds. Musicianship is an example of long-term training that can result in the development of superior auditory skills extending beyond the music domain to speech-in-noise perception and auditory cognitive abilities, such as memory and attention.
Kraus_Anderson_Mar2013