Hearing aids from past to present

"The effect of personality characteristics on the effectiveness of group cognitive psychotherapy treatment for tinnitus"

Dr. Beáta Bencsik1, Dr. Csaba Kazinczi2, Dr. Gábor Polony1, Dr. Judit Szigeti F.1

1Department of Otorhinolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery, Semmelweis University,

 Budapest, Hungary

2 Department of Pulmonology, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary

Introduction: Chronic tinnitus causes significant subjective distress. While cognitive-behavioral group interventions facilitate habituation, limited research has explored how personality traits and home practice compliance predict treatment outcomes. This study evaluated the effectiveness of a group-based skill-development intervention for tinnitus coping, and investigated the predictive power of the Big Five personality dimensions and home practice intensity on post-intervention outcomes.

Methods: Using a pre-post design (N = 93), tinnitus distress was measured using the Tinnitus Handicap Inventory (THI), and personality was assessed via the BFI-10. At post-intervention, sessions attended and self-reported home practice frequency were recorded, while controlling for psychiatric history. Data were analyzed using a Wilcoxon signed-ranks test and a two-stage hierarchical linear regression. Additionally, the correlation between Openness and somatosensory amplification (SAS) was examined.

Results: At the group level, a highly significant reduction in tinnitus distress was observed (Z = -7.33, p < .001), with 81.7% of the participants showing improvement. In the hierarchical regression, the first block of control variables (baseline THI, age, sessions, psychiatric history, practice) accounted for 49.8% of the variance in post-test THI scores (Adj. R2 = .436). The inclusion of Big Five dimensions in the second block significantly increased the explained variance to 58.5% (Adj. R2 = .466, Delta R2 = .087). In the final model, home practice intensity was a significant positive predictor (B = 0.380, p = .033), and Openness demonstrated a strong trend-level effect (B = 3.348, p = .063). Openness also correlated significantly with somatosensory amplification (r = .198, p = .044).

Conclusions: The intervention effectively reduces tinnitus distress. The positive predictive value of home practice and Openness reflects need-based compliance and a reflective cognitive style. Patients with higher baseline distress and somatic amplification may invest more effort into practicing, maintaining a heightened sensory focus that results in higher absolute post-test scores despite overall clinical improvement.