Quantifying auditory experience for children who are hard of hearing

Abstract: Even with the implementation of universal newborn hearing screening and early hearing detection and intervention programs, some children who are deaf or hard of hearing continue to experience delays in communication, cognitive, and academic domains that can have long-term implications for their quality of life and well-being. Recent work has suggested that while early intervention is critical to support optimal developmental outcomes for children who are deaf or hard of hearing, a child’s access to acoustic cues through their hearing aids and consistent device use are powerful predictors of individual differences for children who use hearing aids.  In this presentation, a model of cumulative auditory experience will be used as a framework for a line of research examining communication, cognitive, and academic outcomes in children who are hard of hearing who use hearing aids.  Evidence from longitudinal behavioral and neuroimaging studies will be presented to highlight the importance of promoting auditory experience as a primary focus of early intervention for children for whom spoken language is the desired mode of communication. 

Bio: Ryan McCreery is the Vice President of Research and the Director of the Audibility, Perception, and Cognition Laboratory at Boys Town National Research Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska.  As Vice President of Research, Ryan provides strategic leadership to more than 40 laboratories across 5 Centers that comprise the Boys Town Research Program in communication disorders, pediatric behavioral health, and neuroscience.  In his own laboratory, Ryan studies how auditory experience impacts auditory, linguistic, and cognitive outcomes in children who are hard of hearing who use hearing aids.  Ryan received the 2013 Early Career Contributions to Research Award from the American Speech-Language Hearing Association and was named ASHA Fellow in 2020.