Abstract:ObjectiveTo analyze the timbre perception of western musical instruments and Chinese national musical instruments in cochlear implant users, and investigate the different characteristics of musical timbre identification and listening effort between cochlear implant users and normal hearing listeners.Methods20 cochlear implant users and 20 normal hearing listeners were enrolled in this study. The music perception assessment platform was used to evaluate their timbre recognition, and their accuracy of timbre recognition and the response time were recorded and analyzed.Results①The accuracy of timbre recognition of cochlear implant subjects was (80.42± 11.87)%, which was significantly lower than that of the control group［(96.67±4.19)% ］(P＜0.01). ②The cochlear implant users got recognition correct rates of 82.50% for Chinese national musical instruments (pipa and erhu) and 80.00% for western musical instruments, the difference was statistically insignificant(P=0.664). ③For cochlear implant subjects, the average response time was (170.50 ± 21.81)s, while it was (161.85±18.18)s in the control group, and the difference was also statistically insignificant (t=1.363, P＞0.05).ConclusionsThe cochlear implant users perform significantly poorer with greater listening effort than normal hearing peers in the timbre perception test. They are easy to confuse the orchestral instruments. They have no obvious advantage on the perception of Chinese national musical instruments contrast to western musical instruments.