Many people struggle to understand speech in noisy or acoustically complex environments, such as a station concourse, a restaurant or at a concert. Traditional hearing tests reach their limits in such situations: they barely reflect the complexity of real-life listening situations and therefore lack ecological validity.
The SpiN3D project uses three-dimensional audio technologies to simulate ecologically valid everyday scenarios in a controlled laboratory environment. Recordings from the real world are processed in such a way that speech levels, background noise and directional information can be systematically varied. Participants should experience the simulated environments as convincing, not as a laboratory setting.
This allows to investigate fundamental questions in hearing research: What happens in the brain when it processes speech against a background of noise? Why does this sometimes succeed, and where does the process break down? What role does tinnitus play in this? The findings should also reveal how people with hearing impairments experience complex acoustic situations, thereby contributing to the improvement of hearing aids. “We’re bringing reality, we’re bringing real life into the laboratory. This means we can study brain functions whilst simulating situations such as those found in a station concourse, a football stadium or at a concert,” says Prof. Dr Martin Meyer.