title: Danish reading span data from 283 hearing-aid users, including a sub-group analysis of their relationship to speech-in-noise performance.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This study provides descriptive statistics of the Danish reading span (RS) test for hearing-impaired adults. The combined effect of hearing loss, RS score, and age on speech-in-noise performance in different spatial settings was evaluated in a subset of participants.
  
  
  METHODS
  Data from published and unpublished studies were re-analysed. Data regarding speech-in-noise performance with co-located or spatially separated sound sources were available for a subset of participants.
  
  
  METHODS
  RS scores from 283 hearing-impaired participants were extracted from past studies, and 239 of these participants had completed a speech-in-noise test.
  
  
  RESULTS
  RS scores (mean = 41.91%, standard deviation = 11.29%) were related to age (p <0.01), but not pure-tone average (PTA) (p = 0.29). Speech-in-noise performance for co-located sound sources was related to PTA and RS score (both p < 0.01, adjusted R-squared = 0.226). Performance for spatially separated sounds was related to PTA (p < 0.01, adjusted R-squared = 0.10) but not RS score (p = 0.484). We found no differences between the standardized coefficients of the two regression models.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The distribution of RS scores indicated a high test difficulty. We found that age should be controlled when RS scores are compared across populations. The experimental setup of the speech-in-noise test may influence the relationship between performance and RS score.
authors.affiliation: a Eriksholm Research Centre , Snekkersten , Denmark .|b Division of Technical Audiology, Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine , Linköping University , Linköping , Sweden .
authors.forename: Eline
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Borch Petersen
authors.affiliation: a Eriksholm Research Centre , Snekkersten , Denmark .|b Division of Technical Audiology, Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine , Linköping University , Linköping , Sweden .|c Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning , Linköping University , Linköping , Sweden , and.
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Lunner
authors.affiliation: d Centre for the Neural Basis of Hearing, Department of Physiology, Development, and Neuroscience , University of Cambridge , Cambridge , UK.
authors.forename: Martin D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Vestergaard
authors.affiliation: a Eriksholm Research Centre , Snekkersten , Denmark .
authors.forename: Elisabet
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Sundewall Thorén
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001301:Audiometry, Pure-Tone; D001302:Audiometry, Speech; D001309:Auditory Threshold; D003718:Denmark; D005260:Female; D006310:Hearing Aids; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term; D008875:Middle Aged; D009622:Noise / Q000009:adverse effects*; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D019986:Persons with Hearing Disabilities / Q000523:psychology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011932:Reading; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013017:Sound Localization; D013065:Speech Intelligibility; D013067:Speech Perception
keywords: Reading span; hearing impairment; spatially distributed vs. co-located sound sources; speech-in-noise; working memory