The Swedish hearing in noise test for children, HINT-C

Objective The aim of this study was to develop and evaluate a Swedish version of the Hearing In Noise Test for Children (HINT-C). Design In the first part, the Swedish HINT lists for adults was evaluated by children at three signal to noise ratios (SNRs), -4, -1 and +2 dB. Lists including sentences not reaching 50% recognition at +2 dB SNR were excluded and the rest constituted the HINT-C. In the second part, HINT-C was evaluated in children and adults using an adaptive procedure to determine the SNR for 50 % correctly repeated sentences. Study Sample In the first part, 112 children aged 6 to 11 years participated while another 28 children and 9 adults participated in the second part. Results Eight out of 24 tested adult HINT lists did not reach the inclusion criteria. The remaining 16 lists formed the Swedish HINT-C which was evaluated in children 6 to 11 years old. A regression analysis showed that the predicted SNR threshold (dB) was 0.495 - 0.365*age (years + months/12) and the children reached the mean adult score at an age of 10.5 years. Conclusions A Swedish version of HINT-C was developed and evaluated in children six years and older.