In Brief:
This study examined effects of hearing loss and development on the ability to understand speech in noise that was either unmodulated, tempo-rally modulated, spectrally modulated, or both temporally and spectrally modulated. Compared with normal-hearing adults, normal-hearing chil-dren aged 4.6 to 6.9 yr showed reduced masking release for temporal and temporal/spectral modulation, and children aged 7.3 to 11.1 yr showed reduced masking release for temporal/spectral modulation. Both children and adults with hearing impairment showed reduced masking release for all modulation types. The results of children with hearing impairment were the poorest, consistent with combined effects of development and hearing loss.