Noise Awareness Essay

This happens in two ways: listening at too high of a volume, or listening for too long. Studies have confirmed the obvious fact that “the louder the noise and the longer you’re hearing it, the greater the risk of hearing loss” (Siegel). This study concluded that an increasing amount of teens are suffering hearing loss and “wearing earbuds to listen to music may be to blame” (Siegel). The knowledge of loud sounds hurting the ear is well known, but not as many people are aware of the problems caused by listening to music for an extended amount of time. “Constant low-level noise might cause hearing problems, a new study in rats finds” (Cheung). Even music at a low level can damage a listener’s hearing if heard for an extended period of time, but what can losing some hearing really do to a

Long-term noise exposure is an example; this is due to the damage that the noise exposure can have on the sensory hair cells. Sensory hair cells are what allow you to hear and if damaged the ability to hear is reduced and these hair cells do not grow back. As Colin was a car mechanic this meant he will have been in contact and close proximity to loud equipment and machinery daily, this could have had a detrimental effect to his hearing and prevented him from hearing Mary. Other environmental factors include ototoxic drugs, genetic factors and cell damage and neural degeneration which are common effects of aging. Ototoxic drugs can effect hearing as they can damage the inner ear including the hair cells and also the auditory nerve, this is important as it carries the sound information to the

Hearing loss is one of the most common physical conditions in the United States. It has been referred to as an invisible condition, as we can’t see it occurring; all we see is the effects of it (Hearing Loss Association of America). The severity of the loss can range in the classifications of mild, moderate, severe, or profound. It can also occur in just one ear, or both. Hearing loss can occur at any age. People can be born with deafness (which is known as congenital hearing loss), or lose their hearing over a gradual period of time. Causes of why hearing loss occurs vary per person. The most common cause of loss is noise and aging. Buildup in the air, injury, ear infection, rupture eardrum are other causes as well. For children who suffer from hearing loss, most are born with it.

First I will explain how hearing loss works, So it may be no surprise that loud sounds can damage hearing, but what actually happens is that the pain is caused by damage to the nerves in your ear. For example, if you hear something really loud close to your ear the nerves get hit by a huge wave of sound that can damage your hearing. Furthermore, there is the question

What should we know about hearing loss? The main causes for hearing loss is head trauma and exposure to loud sound. The only way we can take care of ourselves is by knowing how to.To prevent hearing loss we can turn down the volume, use earplugs or remove ourselves from situations where noise is excessive. More Importantly, Digan states,”The major source of dangerous noise is a personal media player combined with a pair of earbuds”, ( Pg.11). For example, Digan writes,”Sound is measured in

It has been proven that excessive exposure to a noisy environment can result in permanent hearing damage. The noise could be a result of a variety of environments such as at air shows, concerts, work, home or play. If you work in a noisy environment, you are being exposed every day for many hours! Just because your ears might not be hurting or ringing when you leave the noisy environment, there is still a negative impact on your ears due to the constant noise and its impact is cumulative.

The world is full of noise and excessive noise exposure can cause hearing loss. There is more than 360 million of people are suffering from hearing losses (WHO) and in Canada, around 20% of the population of the total peoples have this problem (Static Canada). The reason for increasing the amount of hearing loss is because of the growing number of older people and the uncontrolled sounds. However, the static Canada shows us that, nearly 42 % peoples are at a risk of noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL), would benefit from putting hearing protection device (HPD). NIHL is becoming more common nowadays and two factors are more important to damage our inner and outer hair cell that is sound pressure level and the duration of exposed this noise by

Roughly one-third of Americans between the ages of 65 and 75 have hearing problems and approximately half the people who are 80 and older have hearing loss. Whether the hearing loss is slight or significant, it is a serious concern.

Increasingly Millennials are starting to experience hearing loss as they grow older. Hearing loss means individuals often can’t make out T’s and K’s. When people listen to music they want to cancel out outside sound however, earbuds don’t cancel out much noise at all. Headphone that either rest on or go around the ear cancel more sound then regular earbuds. Earbud users listen to music at a higher volume to try to cancel out outside sound. This topic is extremely good to inform people because teenagers or adults needs to know that headphones and earbuds are damaging their ears. Listening for an hour with a high volume can permanent ruining your hearing. Virginia Heffernan is not effective at persuading Millennials that headphones are destroying

Foy of the American Osteopathic Association, common hand-held devices can produce sounds up to 120 decibels, this high level of noise can cause noise-induced hearing loss after only about an hour and 15 minutes of continuous listening. Several experts have stated that the increase of hearing loss among children may be caused the recurrent use of earbuds. Noise-Induced Hearing Loss from earbuds is generally a gradual and cumulative occurrence. There are no obvious signs that indicate the start of hearing loss, however, the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders suggests to avoid recurrent loud exposures to sounds at or above 85 decibels as much as possible because these high decibel levels can some form of noise-induced hearing loss (par. 6). The higher the decibel level is, the quicker it takes noise-induced hearing loss to occur. To hear, it relies on a series of events that change the sound waves in the air into electrical signals that get sent to the brain. The ear is split in three “parts” the outer, middle, and inner ear. The National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders explains how sound waves enter in from the outer ear and travel through the ear canal which eventually leads to the eardrum. The eardrum then begins to vibrate from the sound and sends the vibrations to three minuscule bones in the middle ear, the malleus, incus, and stapes. These three bones in the middle ear transform the air sound waves

In 1992, McBride, Gill, Proops, Harrington, Gardiner, & Attwell conducted a study among classical symphony musicians. Sound level measurements during five rehearsals and two performances were taken. An audiometric questionnaire and hearing thresholds were measured by clinical pure tone audiometry. It was not noted whether hearing protection use was advised or recommended. This study concluded that there is a potential for occupational noise induced hearing loss within professional classical musicians. More recently, Jansen, Helleman, Dreschler, & de Laat (2009) investigated a different group of classical musicians using a larger audiological test battery including: a self-report questionnaire, measuring hearing thresholds, loudness perception, diplacusis, tinnitus, speech perception in noise, and otoacoustic emissions. It was concluded that most of the musicians tested had normal hearing but tinnitus, diplacusis, and hyperacusis were more prevalent among this group than what would be typically expected. Schmidt, Pedersen, Paarup, Christensen-Dalsgaard, Andersen, Poulsen, & Bælum (2014) also looked at hearing loss and sound exposure in the classical musician. By obtaining hearing thresholds and a self-reported questionnaire with instrument type and exposure included, it was concluded that NIHL will occur due to the sound exposure time and levels that symphony

As the experiment was conducted in a crowded classroom, the apparent mild hearing loss was due low frequency. The patient was still capable of hearing high frequency, such as speech.

Conductive hearing loss is when there is a problem with the ear canal, ear drum, or middle ear. When there are problems in the middle ear it’s from an issue with the ossicles (malleus, incus, and stapes). There are several types of causes that can produce conductive hearing loss; deformation of outer ear, ear canal, or middle ear, fluid in the middle ear, ear infection, allergies, bad Eustachian tube function, perforated eardrum, benign tumors, impacted earwax, and Otosclerosis (Hearing Loss Association of America). In any of these cases, conductive hearing loss affects the brain by not allowing the inner ear transduce the sound waves into neural signals. The brain cannot receive the signals because the stimulation of sound is being blocked or severely reduced by any of the reasons given above. The brain is either receiving little to no neurological signals and the brain does not like to be bored (Wolfe, Kluender, & Levi, 2015).

The ear is a combination of different organs and body parts that in conjunction allow us to hear. It is a sensitive piece of anatomy that can easily be abused, different frequencies at certain amplitudes through out our audible and inaudible ranges can slowly or very quickly damage our ability to perceive audio, even through something as simple as listening to your headphones mildly to loud. This damage can be present in many different forms each with variable extremities.

Furthermore, earbuds are putting adolescents at risk of noise induced hearing loss. For example, “A report released earlier this year by the World Health Organization (WHO) says that 1.1 billion teens and young adults worldwide are at risk of hearing loss… one main reason is the use of personal audio devices such as iPods, with earbuds or headphones (What Did You Say?, 4).” In other words, as a result of earbuds, adolescents are at a risk of noise induced hearing loss. Many adolescents use earbuds for long periods of time or listen to music at high volume levels without knowing that they are gradually hurting their ears and putting themselves at risk of hearing damage. Furthermore, “...as personal music players become more popular, doctors say they’ve seen an increase in hearing