Diotic presentation of second-order gradient directional hearing aid signals

A hearing aid system, comprising:

• a first instrument for aiding hearing in a first ear of a wearer, including:
• a first microphone system for receiving sound and providing a first output signal representative of the sound received, wherein the first output signal includes a first-order directional signal for the first microphone system;
• and
• a first receiver circuit connected to the first microphone system to receive the first output signal, wherein the first receiver circuit includes a first receiver and a first signal processing circuit, and the first signal processing circuit includes a first summer;
• and
• a second instrument for aiding hearing in a second ear of a wearer, including:
• a second microphone system for receiving sound and providing a second output signal representative of the sound received, wherein the second output signal includes a first-order directional signal for the second microphone system;
• and
• a second receiver circuit connected to the second microphone system to receive the second output signal, wherein the second receiver circuit includes a second receiver and a second signal processing circuit, and the second signal processing circuit includes a second summer;
• wherein the first summer is configured to sum the first-order directional signals from both the first microphone system and the second microphone system to provide a first summed signal that is a second-order directional signal and present the first summed signal to the first receiver, and the second summer is configured to sum the first-order directional signals from both the first microphone system and the second microphone system to provide a second summed signal that is a second-order directional signal and present the second summed signal to the second receiver.

A hearing aid system, comprising a first hearing aid device and a second hearing device, each hearing device including:

• a microphone system for receiving a sound and providing a signal representative of the sound, the microphone system including:
• a directional microphone system for providing a first-order pressure gradient directional signal representative of the sound;
• and
• an omnidirectional microphone system for providing an omnidirectional signal representative of the sound;
• a switch for selecting a mode of operation to provide a selected signal, wherein:
• when an omnidirectional mode of operation is selected, the selected signal includes the omnidirectional signal representative of the sound;
• when a first-order gradient directional mode of operation is selected, the selected signal includes the first-order pressure gradient directional signal;
• and
• when a second-order gradient directional mode of operation is selected, the selected signal includes a sum of the first-order pressure gradient directional signals from the microphone system for both the first and the second hearing aid devices;
• signal processing circuitry for receiving and processing the selected signal into a processed signal representative of the sound;
• and
• a receiver for receiving the processed signal to produce a processed sound that aids hearing.

A method for diotically presenting second-order gradient directional signals to a wearer of hearing aids, comprising:

• receiving a sound both at a first microphone system in a first hearing aid device to provide a first-order gradient directional signal representative of the sound received and at a second microphone system in a second hearing aid device to provide a first-order gradient directional signal representative of the sound received;
• summing the first-order gradient signals provided by the first microphone system and the second microphone system to provide a second-order gradient directional signal;
• and
• presenting the second-order gradient directional signal both to a first receiver in the first hearing aid device and to a second receiver in the second hearing aid device.

A method for aiding hearing for a user wearing a first hearing aid unit for aiding hearing in a first ear of a wearer and a second hearing aid unit for aiding hearing in a second ear of the wearer, the method comprising:

• receiving a sound at a first microphone system in the first hearing aid unit and at a second microphone system in the second hearing aid unit;
• for a first mode of operation, providing a first omnidirectional signal representative of the sound from the first microphone system to a first receiver in the first hearing aid unit and a second omnidirectional signal representative of the sound from the second microphone system to a second receiver in the second hearing aid unit;
• for a second mode of operation, providing a first directional signal representative of the sound from the first microphone system to the first receiver in the first hearing aid unit and a second directional signal representative of the sound from the second microphone system to the second receiver in the second hearing aid unit;
• and
• for a third mode of operation, summing the first directional signal from the first microphone system and the second directional signal from the second microphone system to form a second-order gradient directional signal representative of the sound, and diotically presenting the second-order gradient directional signal to the first receiver in the first hearing aid unit and to the second receiver in the second hearing aid unit.