Conversation tactics in persons with normal hearing and hearing-impairment

Abstract

Only the tactic of speech reading was closely associated with impaired hearing, with some evidence that females were more inclined to use it. Otherwise, all tactics were commonly employed, regardless of hearing status.

Head-Mounted Display Visualizations to Support Sound Awareness for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing

“…Part One Summary. Our findings confirm research in communication strategies of deaf and hard of hearing people with oral partners (e.g., [3,9,28]). Our participants used a variety of adaptive and maladaptive strategies for group conversation and expressed key challenges that may be addressed by our approach (e.g., missing speaker transitions, helping follow simultaneous speakers).…”

“…Findings from Study 1 extend and reaffirm past work [3,9,28] on challenges in group conversations for people with hearing loss who employ speechreading. Specifically, we further motivate the need for glanceable, unobtrusive, and always-available sound awareness to help localize sound sources, focus attention on active speakers, and assist with speaker transitions.…”

“…A maladaptive behavior detracts or inhibits communication, such as avoiding conversation or feigning comprehension [3]. Adaptive behaviors can be verbal or nonverbal, such as asking a speaker to repeat or simplify an utterance, explaining one's hearing loss, or repositioning to improve one's view of the speaker [4,9]. Our head-mounted approach should support non-verbal adaptation by helping to direct visual attention.…”

“…Persons with hearing loss use a variety of strategies to converse with partners who use spoken language, including gestures, two-way note taking, and facial expressions [9]. Researchers have developed classifications for these communication strategies [3,28], which we employ in our analysis.…”

“…Persons who are deaf or hard of hearing rely on visual signals such as body language, facial expressions, and lip movement to interpret speech (speechreading) [4,5,9]. Knowing where to focus visual attention is a prerequisite for effective speechreading.…”