New hearing aids could offer advances in filtering out background noise
“Selective hearing” is commonly applied to children (or husbands) who seem to miss those key points of conversation like walking the dog, or taking out the trash. In the realm of hearing aids, though, selective hearing could actually be a good thing. You see, normal hearing aids pick up all noise in the environment, whether it’s wind blowing, a car roaring, or a person talking. This can make it difficult, to say the least, for someone with hearing loss to pick up on what’s important.Researchers at the Canadian University of Guelph are trying to improve sound differentiation (in technical terms, environmental classification) in hearing aids by using computer chips and computational intelligence algorithms. The idea is to use neural network architecture to copy the processing done in the brain’s auditory network. Hearing aids with this technology would be able to automatically adjust their sound parameters, so that listeners don’t get that motorcycle blasting in their ears as they’re trying to have a conversation at an outdoor cafe. Situations like the one above are what have kept people in the past from taking advantage of their hearing aids, even going so far as to turn the hearing aid off rather than put up with its variations. This makes it more difficult for both the wearer and those around them to carry on a conversation. With the recent studies that show that iPods and other personal music players are causing hearing loss at new record levels, it was inevitable that researchers would be interested in developing one that would appeal to more people.Some of the pricier hearing aids already offer some “environmental classification” features, but the work being done at the University of Guelph could make such hearing aids available to a wider range of listeners. Scientists working on the team include Professor Robert Dony and Professor Shawki Areibi, both from the School of Engineering. Funding is being provided by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council Collaborative Research and Development grant and ON Semiconductor, a Phoenix, Arizona-based electronics supplier.