Hearing assessment in young infants by means of a classical conditioning procedure.
A classical conditioning procedure, in which tones of different intensities and frequencies constituted the conditioned stimuli and an air puff on the corner of the infants' eye represented the unconditioned stimulus, proved to be an effective device for evaluating the hearing ability of young babies. The 45 infants participating in the present study were able to start responding to the presentation of the tones (i.e. complete and prolonged closure of their eye before the onset of the air puff or independent of the puff) in a relatively short period of time. The presence of responding could be regarded as a reliable sign of the infants' hearing functioning across frequencies and intensities.
D001299:Audiometry; D001767:Blinking; D003214:Conditioning, Classical / Q000502:physiology; D004432:Ear, Middle / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006320:Hearing Tests / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male