Internet Streaming Audio Based Speech Reception Threshold Measurement in Cochlear Implant Users

Traditional face-to-face subjective listening test has become a challenge due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We developed a remote assessment system with Tencent Meeting, a video conferencing application, to address this issue. This paper presents our work on evaluating the reliability of the remote assessment system. Two speech reception threshold (SRT) experiments were conducted to study the effects of noise suppression and maxima selection number on cochlear implant (CI) hearing. Both experiments were conducted locally and remotely, the correlations between the respective results were analyzed. Results showed that remote tests replicated the differences among testing conditions observed in local tests, but the absolute SRT values for individual conditions varied significantly between the two modes. The variations could be attributed to multiple reasons, such as online data transmission issues, audio playback devices, environmental conditions, and the training of participants. In conclusion, the relative variation of SRTs for CIs can be measured reliably, but the absolute SRT values should be carefully compared and explained according to objective and subjective experimental conditions.