Communication Tactics for People with Hearing Loss

Wearing hearing aids can increase your ability to hear in most situations, but using several communication techniques could help you to hear. There are several ways to give yourself an advantage in conversation. Utilizing various “communication tactics” can lead to better understanding and allow you to get the most out of your hearing device.

Strategies to Help You Hear Better

Here are some “communication tactics” to help you communicate more effectively. When used in conjunction with your hearing aid, you may find that you can understand more of the content and therefore converse more fully.

• Be assertive

Use the multipurpose disclosure method to let people know that you have a hearing loss. This method of informing someone about your hearing loss goes a step further and lets them know how they can accommodate you. Most people are happy to oblige when they know how they can help facilitate effective communication.

Assure them that shouting is unnecessary, but facing you and speaking normally is helpful. It is possible that you will have to remind them as they get used to conversing in this structured way.

• Use visual cues

You may already use lipreading when you communicate with people and have come to recognize how sounds look on someone’s lips when they are talking. It is natural and helpful in figuring out a word we may have missed.

In asking someone to face you when they talk, you will have an opportunity to also lipread during conversation. Ensure the room or environment is well-lit, also.

• Reduce background noise

Make the effort to find a quieter place to talk, or make the space quieter if possible. Turn down or off the television or radio, for example, or sit at a quiet table in a cafe or restaurant. This can help your hearing aid do less work of filtering out extraneous noise so you can focus on engaging fully with friends, family, or colleagues.

• Context and Clarification

It is normal to miss a word here and there during a conversation. Our brains use the context of the conversation to fill in missing words and make sense of themes. This allows the conversation to progress and for you to continue to contribute.

If you miss something that you cannot contextualize, try as you might, avoid saying, “I can’t hear you,” or, “what did you say?” These questions can lead to frustration for you and the person to whom you are speaking. Instead, ask them to repeat a specific piece of information you missed. For example, “I’m sorry, but can you repeat that last part? I missed what you said about Sunday morning.”

• Please repeat

Please do not be afraid to ask for a repeat! If you keep missing the same word or group of words, ask the person to rephrase what they are saying. To understand them as clearly as you would like, it could be a matter of tone or pitch in the words you are missing.

• Keep Calm and Concentrate

Sometimes there will be instances in which you cannot hear well, despite your best efforts with various tactics. You may begin to feel tense and frustrated when you miss words and information, but working on remaining calm in the moment can allow you to continue to follow the conversation. If you focus on your frustration, it could be harder to catch up with the parts of the conversation you have missed. An unfortunate part of living with hearing loss is that there will be times when you do not hear well, even while wearing a hearing device.

Communicating with Hearing Loss

If you are a person with normal hearing, you can also be aware of the needs of friends and family living hearing loss. Some accommodations you can make include: speaking clearly without shouting, facing the person, shortening the distance between the two of you, and more.

As someone living with hearing loss, there are many more strategies you can use to get the most out of communication, and some may even be of your own creation. Employ these techniques when you meet new people, when in large groups, or adjust them to a given situation. All of these strategies are in service of better communication—in support of and in conjunction with your hearing aid.

If you suspect you have a hearing loss, communication can be greatly improved with a simple hearing test and hearing aid fitting. Look for a provider in your area who can help you identify and treat your hearing loss, and be sure to shop our affordable hearing aids.