Assistive Listening Knowledge Base
  • Peer-reviewed study (online survey)

An Internet Survey of Individuals With Hearing Loss Regarding Assistive Listening Devices

From https://assistivelisteningknowledgebase.org/evidence/harkins-tucker-2007/ · record checked 13 October 2026

  • Harkins J, Tucker P
  • Trends in Amplification 11(2):91-100 (SAGE)

Independent (Technology Access Program, Gallaudet University, for the Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Hearing Enhancement; developed under grant H133E-03006-06 from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, US Department of Education)

Summary

A 2005 online survey of 423 hearing aid and cochlear implant users, recruited mainly through HLAA, on their use of assistive listening devices, problems with receivers borrowed at venues, and where they get information.

Key findings

  • Results, Suggestions and Problems, immediately before Table 4, calls the 276 public-venue borrowers 83% of recent device users. The opening Results paragraph gives 423 completed responses and 67 people reporting no device use in the previous two years, implying 356 recent users; it does not explain the different base implied by 83%. The borrower count is usable without reconstructing that percentage. Methods gives a two-year recall interval for other device-use questions, but does not separately state one for the public-venue borrowing item.
  • Table 4 gives the remaining often/very often versus at-least-sometimes pairs among 276 venue borrowers: poor sound 51%/67%, incompatibility 47%/77%, interference 44%/78%, dead batteries 34%/70%, difficulty controlling own voice 27%/55%, and difficulty with receiver controls 12%/35%.
  • Results, Listening Situations and Assistive Listening Device Use, reports that 58% had used assistance in the previous two years as an audience member with the speaker more than 10 feet away. The Discussion reports better speech understanding for 89% of users in that situation; Figure 2 identifies the audience-benefit subgroup as 274. This compares assistance with hearing aids or implants alone, not one transmission technology with another.
  • In Suggestions and Problems, immediately after Table 4, 76% were willing to purchase a hypothetical universal personal receiver, 5% were unwilling and 19% were unsure; no item count is printed there. Methods describes recruitment through the HLAA convention, its newsletter and chapters, and the Beyond Hearing listserver, with the survey online July-September 2005.
  • Of 276 respondents who had borrowed a receiver at a public venue, 65% often or very often found no signs showing where to check one out (85% at least sometimes), and 67% often or very often found staff not trained to operate the equipment (85% at least sometimes); these were the two most frequent problems.
  • Other problems met at least sometimes were interference or buzzing (78%), a receiver that would not work with the respondent's hearing aid or implant (77%), dead batteries (70%) and poor sound quality (67%).
  • 85% had telecoils, and the telecoil or a room loop was the most used way of connecting to assistive listening in the previous two years (65%), followed by neckloops (48%).
  • The most used sources of information on hearing technology were consumer organisations (73%), meetings and conferences (68%) and word of mouth (67%). Audiologists were the most cited professional source (59%); 12% named professional associations.
  • The authors note that other surveys show a gap between audiologists' claims to have informed clients about assistive listening devices and clients' belief that they were informed.
  • 22% of respondents used cochlear implants on one or both ears; results are not separated by device.

Limits

A self-selected online sample recruited mainly through HLAA and online hearing-loss groups, mostly with severe or profound loss and long experience of hearing technology, which the authors say cannot be generalised. Data from July to September 2005, before Auracast and Wi-Fi streaming; the survey did not record which venue technology respondents had borrowed.

Read the original

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4111414

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Cited in

Cite this source

Harkins J, Tucker P. An Internet Survey of Individuals With Hearing Loss Regarding Assistive Listening Devices. Trends in Amplification 11(2):91-100 (SAGE). June 2007. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4111414/ (accessed 13 October 2026).

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