Uncti on in Listeners Having High-frequency Sensorineural Hearing Loss

Two-tone mnnasking, psychophysical tuning curves and pure-tone masking patterns were measured at 500 and 1000 Hz in 17 listeners having high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss due to noise exposure. Results were compared to similar data obtained from 20 normal-hearing young adults. In addition, measures of word-recognition ability, were ob 'tained in quiet and in noise for both Rroups. The primary findings were as follows: (a) 29% (n = 5) of the hearing-impaired subjects exhibited abnorlnal results on at least one of the psychoacoustic tasks investigated; (b) the observed abnormalities were reliable; and (c) there appeared to be a relation between the presence ofmidfrequency dysfunction and degree of difficulty on word-recognition tasks. These results and their implications are discussed.