Example Career: Hearing Aid Specialists

Career Description

Select and fit hearing aids for customers. Administer and interpret tests of hearing. Assess hearing instrument efficacy. Take ear impressions and prepare, design, and modify ear molds.

What Job Titles Hearing Aid Specialists Might Have

• Audioprosthologist

What Hearing Aid Specialists Do

• Perform basic screening procedures, such as pure tone screening, otoacoustic screening, immittance screening, and screening of ear canal status using otoscope.
• Administer basic hearing tests including air conduction, bone conduction, or speech audiometry tests.
• Select and administer tests to evaluate hearing or related disabilities.
• Maintain or repair hearing aids or other communication devices.
• Train clients to use hearing aids or other augmentative communication devices.
• Create or modify impressions for earmolds and hearing aid shells.
• Read current literature, talk with colleagues, and participate in professional organizations or conferences to keep abreast of developments in audiology.
• Demonstrate assistive listening devices (ALDs) to clients.
• Diagnose and treat hearing or related disabilities under the direction of an audiologist.
• Assist audiologists in performing aural procedures, such as real ear measurements, speech audiometry, auditory brainstem responses, electronystagmography, and cochlear implant mapping.

What Hearing Aid Specialists Should Be Good At

• Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
• Oral Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
• Written Comprehension - The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
• Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.
• Near Vision - The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
• Speech Recognition - The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
• Speech Clarity - The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
• Deductive Reasoning - The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
• Inductive Reasoning - The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).

What Hearing Aid Specialists Should Be Interested In

• Investigative - Investigative occupations frequently involve working with ideas, and require an extensive amount of thinking. These occupations can involve searching for facts and figuring out problems mentally.

What Hearing Aid Specialists Need to Learn

• Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
• Sales and Marketing - Knowledge of principles and methods for showing, promoting, and selling products or services. This includes marketing strategy and tactics, product demonstration, sales techniques, and sales control systems.
• Psychology - Knowledge of human behavior and performance; individual differences in ability, personality, and interests; learning and motivation; psychological research methods; and the assessment and treatment of behavioral and affective disorders.
• Computers and Electronics - Knowledge of circuit boards, processors, chips, electronic equipment, and computer hardware and software, including applications and programming.
• English Language - Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
• Education and Training - Knowledge of principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.