The modern cell phone has become our portable wallet, computer, camera, email, music source, and address book all wrapped up in one shiny device. If you’re the parent or grandparent of a teenager, you may lament the pervasive nature of this artificial appendage and you may join many others in being concerned about the cell phone’s impact on our collective ability to communicate. For people wearing hearing aids, however, a smart phone is a tool that improves communication with an ease and convenience that is unrivaled.
One feature that turns a cell phone into a powerful communication tool for the hearing impaired, is closed captioning apps. Closed Captioning (CC) is a system that displays text on a screen to give the viewer information about what is happening. Closed captioning differs from subtitles in the depth of information given. Subtitles are used to translate dialogue from one language to another and closed captioning provides descriptions of audio information like music and sound effects, in addition to a transcription of dialogue. The more detailed information is geared towards people with hearing loss.
There are two types of captioning. Closed captioning must be activated by the user to be visible. Most of us are aware of the CC button on our tv remote which allows us to activate closed captioning. Open captioning describes captions that are visible to all viewers and are a permanent part of the show, film or video.
One of the biggest adaptation challenges for hearing-aid users is processing speech in conversations with multiple speakers or with loud background noises. Dynamic conversations and loud noises are the hallmarks of many of our favorite shows, movies and life moments, so closed captioning was introduced to improve the experience. Mobile closed captioning takes it to the next level.
Everyone’s technological sensibilities are different, so here are a few options to explore for your personal mobile captioning needs:
For a comprehensive list of captioning options, visit 3PlayMedia’s list of “What Apps and Smart Phones are Caption Friendly?” For questions about which apps are compatible with your hearing aid, please schedule a consultation with us.
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