Contribution
Interactive Virtual Reality for Hearing Aid Evaluation
* Presenting author
Abstract:
Traditional laboratory experiments for hearing aid evaluation often fail to capture the complexity of human behaviour. However, with the increasing selectivity of directional algorithms, new machine learning-based source separation methods, and the advent of behavioural control in hearing instruments, it is essential to incorporate natural user behaviour into hearing aid evaluation. This is especially important in typical multi-party conversational environments, which can be challenging for many hearing aid users.This talk provides an overview of the potential and limitations of interactive virtual reality for hearing aid evaluation in the context of several studies. Virtual acoustic simulation provides direct access to all clean speech and noise signals, allowing for a detailed online and post-hoc analysis. The representation of interlocutors with their avatars in the form of 3D animated virtual characters has limitations in terms of realism of non-verbal behaviour. However, this can be turned into a feature, allowing for systematic control of the representation by transmitting a controlled subset of non-auditory information, such as lip movement, head movements, eye blinks, gaze behaviour, or gestures.