Accurate pitch perception in cochlear implants (CIs) remains challenging, making psychophysical measures susceptible to procedural biases. In unilateral pitch ranking, subjects judge which of two successive stimuli is higher in pitch, typically yielding electrode order roughly consistent with tonotopy. In our study with 10 MED-EL CI users, each of the 12 electrodes was compared with its three next neighbors....
Audiologists using pitch ranking tasks for cochlear implant programming or research should consider counterbalancing or randomizing stimulus presentation order to reduce procedural bias in results.
Presentation-order bias in pitch ranking tests can distort CI fitting and research outcomes; identifying and mitigating this bias improves the reliability of a widely used assessment tool.
- 01Presentation order significantly affects pitch ranking sensitivity in both CI users and normal-hearing listeners.
- 02Study identifies procedural bias as a confound in pitch ranking tasks commonly used in CI research and fitting.
- 03Mitigation strategies were tested and shown to reduce order-related bias.
- 04Findings apply to both clinical CI programming and psychoacoustic research contexts.
- 05Published in Trends in Hearing.
Presentation order significantly affects pitch ranking sensitivity in cochlear implant users and normal-hearing listeners.
studysupportedMitigation strategies can reduce presentation-order bias in pitch ranking tasks.
studysupported- PMID
- 42453039
- DOI
- 10.1177/23312165261447074.
- Journal
- Trends in Hearing
- Publication type
- research_article
- Evidence level
- 2b
- Population
- Cochlear implant users and normal-hearing listeners
- Intervention
- Variation of stimulus presentation order in pitch ranking tasks
- Comparator
- Standard (unmitigated) pitch ranking presentation order
Primary outcomes
Pitch ranking sensitivity as a function of presentation order; Effectiveness of mitigation strategies in reducing order-related bias