Comprehension of spoken language by older adults depends not only on effects of hearing
acuity and age-related cognitive change but also on characteristics of the message,
such as syntactic complexity and presentation rate. When younger and older adults
with clinically normal hearing and with mild-to-moderate hearing loss were tested
on comprehension of short spoken sentences that varied in syntactic complexity, minimal
effects of age and hearing were seen in comprehension of syntactically simpler sentences,
even at rapid speech rates. By contrast, both age and hearing loss were associated
with poorer comprehension for more syntactically complex sentences, and these differences
were further exacerbated by increases in speech rate. These findings illustrate a
dynamic interaction between age, hearing acuity, and characteristics of the spoken
message on speech comprehension.
Key Words
aging - hearing loss - speech comprehension - speech rate - syntactic complexity
