Objective: The study investigated the association between emotional responses to environmental sounds and various well-being indicators.
Design: Participants rated 120 environmental sounds on valence and arousal and completed questionnaires assessing affect in daily life, emotional communication in hearing, pleasantness of everyday listening, and mental well-being.
Study sample: Forty hearing aid (HA) users and 90 individuals with self-reported normal hearing (NH) were recruited. The NH group was divided into two subgroups based on their hearing difficulties score on the Hearing-Related Lifestyle Questionnaire: 36 with no-to-minimal hearing difficulties ("NH no-difficulty" group) and 54 with some hearing difficulties ("NH some-difficulty" group).
Results: NH some-difficulty group reported greater challenges in emotional communication, reduced pleasantness of everyday listening, and poorer mental well-being compared to the NH no-difficulty group. HA users showed greater difficulties in emotional communication and lower listening enjoyment than both NH groups. Higher sensitivity to both positive and negative emotional sounds was linked to greater emotional communication difficulties. A more positive perception of typically negative sounds was associated with a more pleasant experience in everyday listening situations and better mental well-being.
Conclusions: Targeting how individuals interpret and manage emotional reactions to sound may help improve well-being outcomes, particularly for individuals with hearing difficulties.
Keywords: Emotion; environmental sounds; hearing loss; well-being.