A binaural auditory steering strategy based hearing-aid algorithm design

Abstract

Beamforming techniques are widely used in hearing aids to enhance the intelligibility of speech from a target direction, but they tend to isolate the listener from their acoustic environment and distort spatial cues. The main reason for this is that a typical beamformer method alters the head-related transfer function of the individual users' ears and functions under monaural assumptions instead of a binaural model. In this letter, a binaural auditory steering strategy (BASS) is proposed for the design of asymmetrically presented spatial filters which improves awareness of the surrounding acoustic environment while preserving intelligibility from a target direction. Additionally, an objective metric and the results of a subjective study to evaluate the effectiveness of the BASS are presented.