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Biomedical subjects

W Niemeyer

Publications and source records attributed to W Niemeyer.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1981

Do the blind hear better? Investigations on auditory processing in congenital or early acquired blindness. I. Peripheral functions.

18 normally hearing blind students and 18 matched normal-sighted students were compared with regard to differential auditory sensitivity and acoustic reflex thresholds. Evaluation of interaural time differences for directional hearing and acoustic reflex thresholds showed no differences between the groups. The difference limen for intensity when interpreted by the SISI test, and the difference limen for frequency revealed a slightly optimizing trend in the blind group. However, differences missed statistical significance as to difference limen for intensity and, in the 3-orange, also as to difference limen for frequency. Any superior hearing of the blind was not mirrored by a corresponding superiority in peripheral supraliminal performance.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Do the blind hear better? Investigations on auditory processing in congenital or early acquired blindness. II. Central functions.

The same 18 normally hearing students and 18 matched normal-sighted students, as in part I of this study, were compared in regard to pure-tone integration, speech discrimination ability and late cortical-evoked potentials. The blind subjects showed increased disinhibition ('cleaning') with broad-band noise and a decreased inhibition with the same stimulus at the contralateral ear, better speech discrimination, especially with regard to sentence tests without and with competing environment-simulating noise, and, by electric response audiometry (ERA), a shortened N1 latency. Thus, the hypothesis of a better utilization of auditory information after the loss of the visual information channel could be confirmed, and may be ascribed to the plasticity of the central nervous system.

Adult↗