172 / 264
noise presentation ear and device condition was also sig-
nificant (F(2,14) = 6.192,
p
= 0.01,
G
2
= 0.165). Post hoc
pairwise
t
tests showed that scores were significantly lower
when noise was presented to the better ear than when noise
was presented to the poorer ear, but only in the unaided
condition (t(7) = 8.33,
p
= 0.001); the differences related to
ear of noise presentation for the BAHD and CROS devices
were not significant. Figure 2 shows that scores were
slightly higher for both devices relative to the unaided
condition with noise presented to the better ear (S0Nbe),
and slightly lower with noise presented to the poorer ear
(S0Npe), although these differences were also not found to
be significant.
QuickSIN Scores
Figure 3 shows mean QuickSIN scores for all three
device conditions with babble noise presented to the
poorer and better ear, with error bars showing 95% con-
fidence intervals. A slight departure from normality was
detected in the unaided condition with noise to the poorer
ear (W = 0.796,
p
= 0.026), but there was no significant
skew or kurtosis in any condition, and so data were an-
alyzed with a repeated measures ANOVA. A significant
main effect of noise presentation ear was found (F(1,7) =
54.8,
p
= 0.0001,
G
2
= 0.496), indicating that scores
were better when noise was presented to the poorer ear.
The interaction between noise presentation ear and de-
vice condition was also significant (F(2,14) = 15.5,
p
=
0.0002,
G
2
= 0.218). Post hoc pairwise
t
tests with
Bonferroni corrections showed that scores were signifi-
cantly better with noise presented to the poorer ear for
the unaided condition (t(7) = 7.1,
p
= 0.003). There were
no significant differences between device conditions with
noise presented to the better ear, but scores with the
CROS device were significantly poorer than in the
unaided condition with noise presented to the poorer ear
(t(7) = 8.96,
p
= 0.0007).
Self-Assessment Questionnaires
The BBSS and SSQ questionnaires were scored using
the standard test procedures. As in Kompis et al. (27),
individual totals for the BBSS were obtained by adding
the ratings for each listening scenario. The average total
score was 26.2 (range = 12.5
Y
39) for the BAHD and 25.4
(range = 11
Y
40) for the CROS. This finding corresponds
to grand mean ratings of 2.6 for the BAHD and 2.5 for
the CROS. Figure 4 displays mean BBSS ratings for all
listeners and both devices using an equal-area violin
plot, truncated at minimum and maximum values. These
data were not distributed normally in 6 of the 20 sub-
conditions, so a Friedman’s nonparametric ANOVA was
used for subsequent analysis. No significant differences
were found between ratings for the BAHD and CROS, but
ratings varied significantly across test items (
W
2
(9) = 35.4,
p
= 0.00005). Friedman’s post hoc measures indicated that
ratings for conversation in quiet were significantly higher
FIG. 2.
Mean word recognition scores for each device condition
with noise presented to the better ear (S0Nbe), noise presented
the poorer ear (S0Npe), and in quiet (Spe).
Error bars
denote 95%
confidence intervals.
FIG. 3.
Mean speech-to-noise ratio thresholds for the QuickSIN
test in the S0Nbe and S0Npe conditions. Lower values corre-
spond to better performance.
Error bars
denote 95% confidence
intervals.
FIG. 4.
Equal-area violin plot of BBSS ratings for all listeners and
both devices, truncated at maximum and minimum values. Values
of
j
5 correspond to ‘‘Much easier without the device,’’ and values
of +5 correspond to ‘‘Much easier with the device.’’
J. FINBOW ET AL.
Otology & Neurotology, Vol. 36, No. 5, 2015
151