Lubetzky Anat V, Cosetti Maura, Harel Daphna, Sherrod Marlee, Wang Zhu, Roginska Agnieszka, Kelly Jennifer
Department of Physical Therapy, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development, New York University, New York, NY, United States of America.
Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2025 Jan 24;20(1):e0317955. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0317955. eCollection 2025.
What we hear may influence postural control, particularly in people with vestibular hypofunction. Would hearing a moving subway destabilize people similarly to seeing the train move? We investigated how people with unilateral vestibular hypofunction and healthy controls incorporated broadband and real-recorded sounds with visual load for balance in an immersive contextual scene.
Participants stood on foam placed on a force-platform, wore the HTC Vive headset, and observed an immersive subway environment. Each 60-second condition repeated twice: static or dynamic visual with no sound or static white noise or real recorded subway station sounds [real] played from headphones.
Human motion laboratory.
41 healthy controls (mean age 52 years, range 22-78) and 28 participants with unilateral peripheral vestibular hypofunction (mean age 61.5, 27-82).
We collected center-of-pressure (COP, anterior-posterior, medio-lateral) from the force-platform and head (anterior-posterior, medio-lateral, pitch, yaw, roll) from the headset and quantified root mean square velocity (cm/s or rad/s).
Adjusting for age, the vestibular group showed significantly more sway than controls on: COP medio-lateral (no sound or real with static or dynamic visual); COP anterior-posterior (only on dynamic visuals in the presence of either sound); head medio-lateral and anterior-posterior (all conditions), head pitch and yaw (only on dynamic visuals in the presence of either sound). A significant increase in sway with sounds was observed for the vestibular group only on dynamic visuals COP anterior-posterior and head yaw (real) and head anterior-posterior and pitch (either sound).
The addition of auditory stimuli, particularly contextually-accurate sounds, to a challenging, standing balance task in real-life simulation increased sway in people with vestibular hypofunction but not in healthy controls.
Clinical trial registrationThis study was registered on clinicaltrials.gov at the following link: https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT04479761.
我们所听到的声音可能会影响姿势控制，尤其是在前庭功能减退的人群中。听到行驶的地铁声是否会像看到火车行驶一样使人失去平衡？我们研究了单侧前庭功能减退的人和健康对照者如何在沉浸式情境场景中，将宽带声音和真实录制的声音与视觉负荷相结合以保持平衡。
参与者站在置于测力平台上的泡沫垫上，佩戴HTC Vive头戴式耳机，并观察一个沉浸式地铁环境。每个60秒的情境重复两次：静态或动态视觉且无声音、静态白噪声或通过耳机播放的真实录制的地铁站声音[真实声音]。
人体运动实验室。
41名健康对照者（平均年龄52岁，范围22 - 78岁）和28名单侧外周前庭功能减退的参与者（平均年龄61.5岁，27 - 82岁）。
我们从测力平台收集压力中心（COP，前后、内外侧）数据，从头戴式耳机收集头部（前后、内外侧、俯仰、偏航、滚动）数据，并量化均方根速度（厘米/秒或弧度/秒）。
在调整年龄后，前庭功能减退组在以下方面的摆动明显大于对照组：COP内外侧（无声音或真实声音且为静态或动态视觉）；COP前后（仅在有声音的动态视觉情况下）；头部内外侧和前后（所有情况），头部俯仰和偏航（仅在有声音的动态视觉情况下）。仅在前庭功能减退组中，在动态视觉下，COP前后、头部偏航（真实声音）以及头部前后和俯仰（任何一种声音）时，随着声音的加入，摆动显著增加。
在现实生活模拟中的具有挑战性的站立平衡任务中，添加听觉刺激，特别是情境准确的声音，会增加前庭功能减退者的摆动，但不会增加健康对照者的摆动。
临床试验注册本研究在clinicaltrials.gov上通过以下链接注册：https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT04479761 。
