Effect of hearing loss, centre frequency, and bandwidth on the shape of loudness functions in categorical loudness scaling.

Loudness functions of narrow-band and broad-band stimuli were measured with eight normally-hearing and eight hearing-impaired listeners using a categorical loudness scaling method. In the normally-hearing listeners, narrow-band stimuli, generally generated loudness functions whose slope increased with increasing level, whereas broad-band stimuli generated more linear loudness functions. These differences can be explained by the level dependence of spectral loudness summation, which is known to be most prominent at moderate levels. In the hearing-impaired listeners, the narrow-band loudness functions generally showed a more linear shape than in the normally-hearing listeners. A consequence of these findings might be that the optimal shape of the input/output curve of a hearing aid is affected not only by the signal power in the respective frequency channels but also by the bandwidth of the input signal. However, there were considerable differences between listeners in both groups regarding the individual shape and absolute position of the loudness functions. Therefore, no normative reference could be extracted that would allow for a quantification of the bandwidth effect on an individual basis.