Investigation of Electrophysiological Patterns and Multiple Treatments in Tinnitus

Tinnitus is the most common auditory desorder, it is defined as a sound sensation in the absence of any external sound source. Sleep disturbances and depression are symptoms very often present in tinnitus patients. Starting from this observation, in the present thesis two electrophysiological approaches to tinnitus study are described: the former concerns sleep architecture pattern investigation in tinnitus patients, and the second concerns an index of serotonin activity in the auditory cortex the intensity dependence of auditory evoked potential (IDAP). Beyond electrophysiological studies we also investigated two tinnitus therapies,we focused on the study of the Mozart effect and of the mindfulness based stress reduction therapy, because sound therapy and treatments aiming at increasing patient's strategies to face tinnitus are among the most common tinnitus therapies.