Glossary

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Assistive Listening Device(also: ALD, Hearing Assistive Technology)

Any device designed to improve audibility for a person with hearing loss, beyond or in addition to a hearing aid or cochlear implant. Common examples include personal amplifiers, FM and radio-frequency systems, infrared systems, and induction loop (hearing loop) systems…

Audiogram(also: Hearing Test Chart, Pure-tone Audiogram)

An audiogram is a graph of a person's hearing thresholds measured across a range of frequencies — typically 250 Hz to 8 kHz — plotted separately for each ear. Thresholds are expressed in decibels hearing level (dB HL) relative to the expected threshold of a young, healthy ear,…

Auditory Comprehension(also: Listening Comprehension)

The cognitive and linguistic ability to understand spoken language in real time, including recognising words, parsing grammar, holding clauses in working memory, and integrating meaning across sentences. Frequently impaired in people living with aphasia, age-related hearing…

Auditory agnosia(also: Sound agnosia, Acoustic agnosia)

A neurological condition characterized by difficulty recognizing or distinguishing sounds despite having intact hearing. People with auditory agnosia can hear sounds but may struggle to identify what they are—such as not recognizing a ringing phone, a doorbell, or environmental…

Background Noise(also: Ambient noise, Environmental noise)

The sum of unwanted or competing sound in an environment — traffic, construction, conversation, HVAC systems, weather — that is present alongside a signal of interest. Background noise is characterized by sound level (dB), spectral content, duration, and steadiness versus…

Bone conduction(also: Bone conduction hearing, Bone anchored hearing)

Bone conduction is a method of sound transmission that delivers audio vibrations through the bones of the skull directly to the inner ear, bypassing the outer and middle ear. Bone conduction technology is used in hearing aids and headphones designed for people with conductive…

Bone-Conducting Headphones(also: Bone Conduction Headphones, Bone Conduction Headset)

Headphones that transmit sound by vibrating the skull bones directly to the inner ear, bypassing the outer and middle ear and leaving the ear canals open. In accessibility contexts they are widely used by blind travellers and wayfinding systems because the wearer can continue to…

Cochlear Implant(also: CI)

A surgically implanted electronic device that provides a sense of sound to individuals who are severely deaf or hard of hearing. Unlike hearing aids that amplify sound, cochlear implants bypass damaged portions of the ear and directly stimulate the auditory nerve. Users still…

Cochlear Implant(also: CI)

A surgically implanted electronic device that provides a sense of sound to individuals who are deaf or have severe hearing loss. Unlike hearing aids which amplify sound, cochlear implants bypass damaged portions of the inner ear and directly stimulate the auditory nerve. The…

Decreased Sound Tolerance(also: DST, Sound Intolerance)

Decreased sound tolerance (DST) is an umbrella term for conditions in which everyday sounds are perceived as uncomfortably loud, threatening, or emotionally distressing. It encompasses hyperacusis (abnormal sensitivity to sound volume), misophonia (strong emotional reactions to…

Frequency Selectivity(also: Auditory Frequency Resolution, Critical Band Selectivity)

Frequency selectivity is the auditory system's ability to separate closely-spaced frequencies into distinct perceptual streams — the reason a typical listener can follow one voice in a crowd, hear the bass line under a melody, or distinguish similar speech sounds like 's' and…

Hard of Hearing(also: HoH, HH)

A term describing people with hearing loss ranging from mild to severe who typically have some functional hearing, often with the assistance of hearing aids or other amplification devices. Unlike many Deaf individuals who identify with Deaf culture and use sign language, people…

Hearing Aid(also: Hearing Aids)

An electronic device worn in or behind the ear that amplifies sound to assist people with hearing loss. Modern hearing aids include digital signal processing, directional microphones, and connectivity features like Bluetooth. While hearing aids improve access to speech and…

Hearing Aid(also: HA, BTE, Behind-the-Ear)

An electronic device worn in or behind the ear that amplifies sound for individuals with hearing loss. Modern hearing aids include features such as Bluetooth connectivity, directional microphones, and noise reduction. Behind-the-ear (BTE) models are among the most common styles.…

Hearing Loss(also: Hearing Impairment, Hard of Hearing, Deafness)

A partial or total inability to hear sounds, ranging from mild hearing loss to profound deafness. Hearing loss can be congenital or acquired, and becomes increasingly common with age, affecting approximately one-third of people over 65. Digital accessibility for people with…

Hyperacusis(also: Decreased sound tolerance)

A hearing condition in which everyday sounds are perceived as uncomfortably or painfully loud, even at volume levels that are tolerable for most people. Hyperacusis involves a reduced tolerance for the overall volume of sound rather than sensitivity to specific sound types…

Intralingual Subtitling(also: Same-language subtitling, SLS)

The practice of transcribing and synchronising audio content into text in the same language as the spoken audio. Intralingual subtitling differs from interlingual (translation) subtitling and is particularly important for deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers, second-language…

Listening Fatigue(also: Auditory Fatigue)

The mental and physical exhaustion experienced from sustained effortful listening, commonly reported by people who are Hard of Hearing or use hearing aids and cochlear implants. Listening fatigue can reduce comprehension, concentration, and engagement over time. In the context…

Loudness Recruitment(also: Recruitment, Hyperacusis-like Recruitment)

Loudness recruitment is a common consequence of sensorineural hearing loss in which the range between 'just audible' and 'uncomfortably loud' sounds is compressed — quiet sounds are harder to hear, but sounds above threshold grow louder more rapidly than in a typical listener.…

Normal-Hearing Listener(also: NH Listener, Normal Hearing)

A research term for a participant whose audiometric thresholds fall within the clinical normal range (typically pure-tone thresholds of 25 dB HL or better across speech frequencies), used as a comparison group in hearing-accessibility studies. Normal-hearing (NH) listeners are…

Phonophobia(also: Sound Phobia, Ligyrophobia)

Phonophobia is an intense fear or aversion to specific sounds or loud noises that goes beyond simple discomfort, often leading to avoidance behaviors such as fleeing from environments where triggering sounds may occur. Unlike hyperacusis (heightened sensitivity to sound volume)…

Post-lingual Deafness(also: Post-linguistic Deafness, Acquired Deafness, Late-Onset Deafness)

Deafness that occurs after a person has acquired spoken language, meaning they have existing literacy in written and spoken language. Post-lingual deaf users can typically read and write fluently, making text-based accessibility features like captions and transcripts highly…

Postlingual Deafness(also: Postlingually Deaf, Acquired Hearing Loss)

Hearing loss that occurs after a person has acquired spoken language, typically after about age three to five. Postlingually deaf people usually retain spoken-language fluency, literacy, and memory of sound, which affects their rehabilitation trajectory and their experience of…

Pre-lingual Deafness(also: Pre-linguistic Deafness, Congenital Deafness)

Deafness that occurs before a person acquires spoken language, either present from birth or developing in early childhood. People with pre-lingual deafness typically use sign language as their primary means of communication and may have limited literacy in written/spoken…

Prelingual Deafness(also: Prelingually Deaf, Congenital Deafness)

Deafness present at birth or acquired before a child has developed spoken language, typically before around age three. Prelingually deaf individuals commonly learn a signed language as a first language and may have different literacy trajectories in the surrounding…

Presbycusis(also: Age-Related Hearing Loss, Presbyacusis)

A gradual, progressive loss of hearing in both ears that occurs as a natural part of aging, primarily affecting the ability to perceive higher-frequency sounds. Presbycusis is the most common cause of hearing loss in older adults and has significant implications for the design…

Sensorineural Hearing Loss(also: SNHL, Nerve Deafness)

Sensorineural hearing loss is hearing loss caused by damage to the hair cells of the inner ear (cochlea) or the auditory nerve, in contrast to conductive hearing loss, which involves the outer or middle ear. SNHL is the most common type of permanent hearing loss in adults and is…

Sloping Hearing Loss(also: High-frequency Hearing Loss, Sloping SNHL)

Sloping hearing loss is a common audiogram shape in which hearing thresholds are relatively preserved at low frequencies and progressively worse at higher frequencies, producing a downward slope on the audiogram. It is the typical presentation of age-related hearing loss…

Speech Intelligibility(also: Speech Recognition Score, Word Recognition)

A measure of how well speech can be understood by a listener, typically expressed as the percentage of words or sentences correctly identified under specific listening conditions. Speech intelligibility is affected by factors including audio bandwidth, background noise, signal…

Speech Visualization(also: Visual Speech Display, Speech-to-Visual Display)

Speech visualization refers to techniques that convert spoken language into visual representations to aid comprehension, particularly for individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing. These displays can range from real-time captioning and waveform displays to more abstract…

Tinnitus(also: Ringing in the Ears)

Tinnitus is the perception of sound - most commonly ringing, buzzing, or hissing - without a corresponding external source. It can be continuous or intermittent, uni- or bilateral, and ranges from mild background nuisance to severely disabling. Tinnitus is often associated with…

Usher Syndrome(also: Usher's Syndrome)

A genetic condition that is the most common cause of combined deafness and blindness (deafblindness). It is characterized by sensorineural hearing loss present from birth and progressive vision loss from retinitis pigmentosa, which typically begins in adolescence or young…

Visual Speech Aid(also: Speech Reading Aid, Visual Communication Aid)

A visual speech aid is an assistive device or system that converts auditory speech information into visual form to help individuals with hearing impairments follow spoken conversation. These aids may display text (as in captioning systems), phonetic symbols, lip-shape cues,…

Word deafness(also: Pure word deafness, Auditory verbal agnosia)

A specific type of auditory agnosia in which a person can hear speech sounds but cannot comprehend spoken words, despite having normal hearing and the ability to read, write, and speak. People with word deafness describe speech as sounding like an unfamiliar foreign language or…

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