Age Differences in the Ability to Use Visual Cues in Auditory Communication

Abstract

The purpose of the present investigation was to examine whether with age, older workers who suffered from a loss in hearing acuity, developed compensatory skills. Tests of speechreading ability were given to men working in industry and the results examined for any variation in the development of this skill with regard to age, amount of hearing-loss and vocabulary level.

The findings indicate that although hearing losses increase with age, there does not appear to be any incidental acquisition of skill in the use of the visual components of speech as an aid to speech intelligibility. In fact the ability to make use of such cues seems to diminish after the age of about 39, and scores obtained by the over-sixties in a specially constructed speechreading test, fall to approximately half of those made by the thirty to thirty-nine year old subjects.

Vocabulary level appears to influence scores made in the speechreading test. There is also a correlation between vocabulary level and performance on the speech test of hearing ability.