Previous work has shown that the sound localization ability of bimodal listeners provided
with a cochlear implant and a hearing aid can be improved when the constant interaural
time delay (timing mismatch - TM) is reduced. The TM is caused by differences in processing
delays of the hearing devices and differences in stimulation sites. When it comes
to spatial release from masking (SRM), our own measurements have shown that the temporal
alignment of the ear signals is also relevant for speech understanding in noise, when
speech and noise sources are not co-located. SRM is as large as 8-9 dB in NH listeners
without a temporal mismatch. As soon as a TM is introduced, SRM decreases. At 7 ms
(typical TM of bimodal listeners) about 4 dB remain. in contrast, our recent findings
in bimodal listeners show that SRM is
