I happen to have a slight hearing loss in high frequencies since birth. It’s not a huge handicap, but like a lot of people, I’ve a hard time understanding people in noisy environments (plus understanding foreign languages, song’s lyrics, etc…).
This thread in GQ was very interesting for me because I learned that the difficulties aren’t simply related to the hearing loss per se but mostly to the ability to “isolate” spatially a specific sound (a specific person speech, for instance).
Some years ago, while I was trying to learn some foreign languages, and this was a real pain, I decided to get hearing aids. I got one lent to me (only in one ear, I mean) by a prothesist.
The result was completely unconvincing. I could hear sounds that I usually don’t (say, dead leaves creaking under my feet), but it didn’t help with useful stuff like understanding people in a noisy environment. Given that those earing aids were quite costly, and were apparently rather useless, I renounced.
However, at about the same time, another prothesist had told me that normally both earing aids were provided during the testing period, not just one. So, now I’m wondering : given that apparently directionality is an or maybe the main issue wrt hearing loss, and that “stereo” hearing is required to discriminate correctly sounds, could it be that, if I had earing aids in both ears, the difference would have been very significant?
IOW, should I try again with another prothesist actually providing both aids, and should I expect an actual significant improvement in this case?
I know loads of people who use one aid (probably more than I know who use two). I don’t think its correct that you need two to be helpful in all cases, it probably depends on your hearing loss.
I do know that modern digital aids can be tuned to your specific loss to a far more specific degree than older analog-type hearing aids.
I’ve a bilateral hearing loss (similar level in both ears). I would have had to buy two hearing aids, but was given only one for the testing.
As I said, there was no helpful improvement, and I assumed that wearing both wouldn’t make much of a difference. For instance, since it didn’t seem that I was understanding better people on my left with an earing aid in the left hear, I assumed I wouldn’t understand anybody better with both earing aids.
But in the thread I linked to, people state that the lack of “stereo” hearing, allowing to discriminate sound by location (the brain ignoring whatever isn’t coming from a given place) is the main issue wrt hearing loss (and it is true that I can have difficulties knowing where a sound is coming from).
So, what I’m wondering is whether having two hearing aids would, rather than just being the same that I experienced on the left except on both sides, result in a very significant improvement by granting me this “stereo discrimination power” that I partially lacks.
I hopes this makes my question clearer.
Also, the earing aid I tested was one of those tuned to my specific loss you mention, which is why they costed so much, in fact.
I am not hearing impaired, but it certainly makes sense that you would need both in order to locate the sounds. I don’t think it would be possible to use the subjective experience of one ear to generalize to what it would be like to hear with both ears and locate sound. Yes you should I hear the same thing with both ears, but it is the speed/level of sound that allows you to guess the location (at least I am assuming this is the case). Neither of which is possible with only one hearing aid (perhaps it would work in borderline cases).
I think I am pretty good at locating sound, but it would be virtually impossible for me to tell you how I do it - It isn’t done on a conscious level - and I don’t think I could tell with one ear (at close to normal) - whether it was enough close to normal to make a difference.
Again - not basing this on experience, but it seems pretty logical that you should give it another shot with aids in both ears. I am guessing in some cases (people) it will work fine - and some people don’t get enough to make a difference.