A method for testing a Hearing Aids, said hearing aid having a microphone, a signal processing unit and an acoustic output transducer, and a signal path proceeding through said signal processing unit between said microphone and said output transducer, said method comprising the steps of: providing a sound channel having a defined acoustic transmission response between said output transducer and said microphone; interrupting said signal path; introducing an electrical test signal into the interrupted signal path; emitting said test signal from said output transducer, as an acoustic tests signal, through said sound channel to said microphone; picking up said acoustic test signal with said microphone and, in said microphone, generating a microphone signal corresponding to said acoustic test signal; and evaluating said microphone signal.
Traditional hearing aid testing in the laboratory normally focuses on how well speech is understood in noise. However, there is much more to the experience of sound in everyday life. Specifically, the spatial aspects of sound, such as from which direction a sound comes or how far away a sound object is, are also important. This spatial awareness is used, for example, when switching attention from one person to another during a meeting or a dinner conversation. It also plays a major role when trying to understand what someone is saying in a very reverberant room.
