Workplace Hearing Loss Diversity, Identity and Disclosure | HLAA HearingU webinar | April 22, 2026

The Hearing Loss Association of America (HLAA) presented this session on April 22, 2026, as part of its quarterly Hearing Loss at Work webinar series. If you are an employee with hearing loss, how do you identify and advocate for yourself on the job? In this webinar, David C. Baldridge, Ph.D., professor at Oregon State University, College of Business, discussed his research on relationships between hearing loss characteristics such as severity, variability and onset age, on how we identify and are seen by others at work. He described the impact of our hearing identities on disclosure, self-advocacy, and hearing assistive technology use. Panelists from HLAA’s Task Force for Accessible, Inclusive Employment—Lisa Yuan, Tori Carapelho and Michael Noble, Task Force chair—shared their own lived experiences, including hearing identities, disclosure, self-advocacy and hearing assistive technology use.