How hearing aids affect the brain and everyday listening
Official title: Hearing Aid Effects on Brain and Behavior
Funded at Portland VA Medical Center · NIH-11465946 · Data updated 2026-11-12
Looks at whether wearing hearing aids changes brain processing and makes hearing, thinking, and listening easier for Veterans with hearing loss or tinnitus.
Quick facts
| Grant type | NIH-funded research |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Portland VA Medical Center NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Portland, United States) |
| Project start | October 1, 2021 |
| Project end | March 31, 2026 |
| Funding year | 2026 |
| NIH project number | 5I01RX003702-05 |
| Project ID | NIH-11465946 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal candidates are Veterans or older adults with hearing loss and/or bothersome tinnitus who are considering or already using hearing aids.
✕Less likely to help
People with normal hearing, severe cognitive impairment, or medical issues that prevent hearing-aid use are unlikely to benefit from this work.
What this research studies
You would wear hearing aids while researchers track both immediate hearing improvements and longer-term changes as you get used to amplification. They will test speech understanding in noisy places, measure thinking and listening effort, and ask about tinnitus bother and quality of life. The team will also record brain activity to see how neural processing adapts with hearing-aid use. Tests and follow-ups occur over weeks to months to compare short-term audibility gains with longer-term acclimatization.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, findings could help clinicians fit hearing aids and design rehabilitation to improve speech understanding, reduce listening effort, and lessen tinnitus bother.
How similar studies have gone: Previous research shows hearing aids improve audibility and can reduce tinnitus bother, but long-term brain and cognitive changes from acclimatization are still not well understood.
Where this research is happening
-
Portland VA Medical Center
Portland, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Billings, Curtis J — Portland VA Medical Center
- Study coordinator: Billings, Curtis J
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About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.