Self-assessment of hearing and related functions - William Noble

This book is about self–assessment in the various and numerous circumstances of clinical and research activities concerning hearing loss and related dysfunctions. It evolved from a review of the the literature on self–assessment of hearing prepared by the author for the International Collegiums of Rehabilitative Audio logy (ICRA), under the auspices of its Working Group on Self–Assessment Methodology.

The opening chapter of the book examines matters of theoretical debate relevant to the self–assessment approach overall. It also looks at technical points from the world of psychometrics and considers the motive for using self–assessment. Chapter 2 records the principal self–assessment devices concerning hearing impairment that have emerged to date, plus subsequent published work using one or more of these scales. Chapter 3 focuses on an analysis of data using one such scale, derived from a sufficiently varied set of backgrounds so as to allow certain methodological and epidemiological questions to be scrutinized. In Chapter 2, and Chapters 4–6, each of which discusses different domains of self–assessment and their applications, the published material is largely presented in tabular form, with accompanying text providing critiques of the important issues most relevant to the field of self–assessment in question. Chapter 2 focuses on the concepts of disability and handicap; Chapters 4–6 address other areas of audiological and related practice and research where self–assessment has emerged.