It has long been acknowledged that there are powerful connections among sound, music, emotion, and memory, and that our personal experiences and tendencies determine the type and intensity of emotional response we have to different sounds. For example, research has revealed these prevalent associations between certain sounds and emotions: The sound of a thunderstorm evokes
The ironic part of hearing loss is that we don’t have a tendency to begin appreciating our favorite sounds until after we’ve lost the capability to clearly hear them. We don’t pause to give thought to, for instance, how much we appreciate a good conversation with a friend until we have to recurrently ask them
The hearing healthcare industry has two barriers that prevent people from achieving better hearing: The inability to recognize hearing loss in the first place (owing to its slow onset), and The temptation to find a quick, easy, and inexpensive remedy. Unfortunately, numerous people who have overcome the first barrier have been lured into the supposedly
Blausen.com staff. “Blausen gallery 2014”. That there is a right way to clean your ears implies that there is a wrong way, and in fact, there is a very wrong way. The wrong way is prevalent, and it breaks the first rule of cleaning your ears: don’t insert foreign objects into your ear canal. That
It’s common to think of hearing loss as an unavoidable problem connected with aging, or, more recently, as a consequence of the younger generation’s routine use of iPods. But the numbers indicate that the bigger problem may be direct exposure to loud noise at work. In the United States, 22 million workers are subjected to
The adage “you get what you pay for” is definitely true of hearing aids, and although modern hearing aids are engineered to be more effective than ever, they’re not exactly inexpensive, either. Luckily, modern digital hearing aids, while not cheap, ARE becoming more reasonably priced, in the same manner that most consumer electronics are becoming
More often than not, people are unaware that they have hearing loss. It develops so gradually that it’s often undetectable, and moreover, the majority of family doctors do not consistently screen for hearing loss at the annual physical exam. Considering these two realities, it’s no surprise that most people first realize they have hearing loss
Approximately 45 million Americans suffer from tinnitus, which is the perception of sound where no external sound source is present. This phantom sound is often identified as a ringing sound, but can also materialize as a buzzing, hissing, whistling, swooshing, or clicking. The first thing to know about tinnitus is that it’s a symptom, not
Zinc-air-battery-types by Marc Andressen is licensed under Attribution CC 2.0 You could make a strong case that the most vital component of your hearing aid is the battery: without it, nothing else works, and if it fails, your hearing fails with it. In this short guide, we’ll provide you with everything you need to know
The World Health Organization estimates that 1.1 billion people are at an increased risk for noise-induced hearing loss, caused by exposure to substantial sound levels from personal audio devices and noisy environments such as clubs, bars, concerts, and sporting events. An projected 26 million Americans currently suffer from the condition. If noise-induced hearing loss occurs
If we really want to understand hearing loss, we need to understand both the physical side, which makes hearing progressively difficult, and the psychological side, which includes the lesser-known emotional responses to the loss of hearing. In concert, the two sides of hearing loss can wreak havoc on a person’s quality of life, as the
Many people are surprised to hear how young the discipline of audiology really is, and just how recently its founding father established the profession. To put this in perspective, if you wanted to find the founding father of biology, for example, you’d have to go back in time by 2,300 years and read the The