The impact of reverberation on speech intelligibility in cochlear implant recipients

Summary

Re-examined how much reverberation harms cochlear implant users' speech understanding, using loudspeaker-based simulations of real rooms at plausible talker distances.

Key findings

• Notes that earlier studies suggested implant users have almost no tolerance for reverberation and are harmed by both early and late reflections.
• Measured speech intelligibility with a loudspeaker-based auralisation of a range of real rooms at plausible source-receiver distances, with and without late reflections, instead of the non-individualised binaural simulations used before.
• Found the effect of reverberation much smaller than earlier studies suggested, especially at short source-receiver distances.
• Found that, contrary to earlier literature, early reflections may not harm implant users.

Limits

Read from the abstract only; the number of participants and the scores could not be read. Simulated rooms in a laboratory; no assistive listening system was tested.

Read the original

doi.org/10.1121/1.5051640

Link checked 9 October 2026. We link to the original and do not host copies.

Cited in

• What reaches a cochlear implant user in a venue, and how well?Partly answered
• How much do room acoustics and distance limit listening without a system, and what follows for choosing one?Partly answered

Cite this source

The accessed date is when this library last checked the link; use the date you read it. To point readers to this summary instead, link to https://assistivelisteningknowledgebase.org/evidence/kressner-2018/

Every finding here cites its source, and who funded each source is labelled. This site does not recommend products. Found an error or a missing study? Suggest a correction.