[Trombone-l] Is music to their ears a threat to hearing?

[Jeff Albert]

People have had portable players with headphones since the 80's.  Are they
saying Walkmans didn't make kids deaf because they had to stop to change the
tape?  I agree that there can be hearing issues with headphone listening,
but it is not new or unique to the iPod.

Jeff

On 3/15/06, Mikel K. Smith <mikelksmith at verizon.net> wrote:
>
> I have to wonder if the manufacturers aren't setting them up for a rash of
> lawsuits a'la big tobacco... "But they didn't warn me that it would make
> me
> deaf"...
>
> Mikel
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: trombone-l-bounces at maillists.samford.edu
> [mailto:trombone-l-bounces at maillists.samford.edu]On Behalf Of Bill
> Dinwiddie
> Sent: Wednesday, March 15, 2006 11:23 AM
> To: List Trombone
> Subject: [Trombone-l] Is music to their ears a threat to hearing?
>
> >From today's Chicago Tribune. I think it is highly relevant to
> trombonists
> and others.
> Bill Dinwiddie
> billdin at comcast.net
>
>
>
> Is music to their ears a threat to hearing?
> iPods are convenient, hip and possibly the reason some teens, young adults
> show signs of hearing loss
>
> By Frank James
> Washington Bureau
> Published March 15, 2006
>
>
> WASHINGTON -- A disturbing number of high school students and adults are
> reporting early signs of hearing loss, and hearing experts think they know
> the culprits: iPods and similar portable devices that allow people to
> funnel
> loud sounds into their ears for hours on end.
>
> More research is needed to conclusively establish the link between the
> cords
> dangling from millions of ears and hearing difficulties. But scientists
> suspect the increasing prevalence of the devices is contributing to the
> rising number of people reporting some form of hearing loss.
>
> Fears and debates about loud music have been around since the dawn of rock
> 'n' roll, of course, from Elvis Presley to the Beatles, Black Sabbath to
> Nirvana.
>
> But the leaps in technology that are allowing commuters on a bus or kids
> walking to high school to feel like they're at a deafening concert are
> also
> channeling ever higher volumes of music more directly, and longer, onto
> eardrums.
>
> Hearing experts who called a news conference here Tuesday to voice their
> fears didn't use the words "crisis" or "epidemic," but it was clear they
> were worried about the results of a survey conducted last month by the
> polling firm Zogby International.
>
> Survey worries experts
>
> Twenty-eight percent of high school students questioned said they had to
> turn up the volume on a TV or radio to hear it better, for example, and 29
> percent of the teenagers said they often found themselves saying, "What?"
> and "Huh?" during normal conversation.
>
> Though that may sound like ordinary behavior for some teenagers,
> audiologists are taking it seriously, especially because the adult
> percentages weren't much lower.
>
> "The results should give pause to anyone who's concerned about the
> nation's
> hearing health," said Alex Johnson, president of the American
> Speech-Language-Hearing Association, based in Rockville, Md. The survey
> was
> conducted for the group.
>
> "While the cause of the symptoms was not identified, the polling showed
> that
> people are listening louder and longer--habits made easier by strides in
> listening technology, but ones that may also contribute to hearing
> damage,"
> said Johnson, chairman of the audiology and speech-language pathology
> department at Wayne State University.
>
> The polling results and warnings mirror concerns voiced by other hearing
> experts in recent years. These experts estimate that more than 28 million
> Americans have some hearing loss, a figure that some think will reach 80
> million in 25 years as Baby Boomers age.
>
> Johnson and others suggested that consumers take precautions, including
> parents monitoring the volume of the music as well as how long their
> children listen to it.
>
> The experts also recommended consumers buy the often pricey headphones
> that
> block out external sounds like subway or airplane noise, the idea being
> that
> consumers then wouldn't need to crank up the volume to overcome background
> noise.
>
> And they suggested that manufacturers limit the volume on their products.
> Dean Garstecki, a communication sciences and medical professor at
> Northwestern University, said, "I think companies who produce these
> products
> have an obligation to limit the output of the devices to a level that does
> not cause hearing loss." He noted that hearing-aid makers do as much in
> order to prevent causing additional hearing loss.
>
> Government limits
>
> If manufacturers of the portable devices do not act voluntarily, Garstecki
> suggested the U.S. government could follow the French example. France set
> a
> 100-decibel limit on iPods and other devices, but there is no such limit
> in
> the U.S. Apple Computer Inc., iPod's manufacturer, temporarily removed the
> devices from French stores to update the software to meet the legal
> restriction, according to a lawsuit filed against Apple by a Louisiana man
> who claimed an iPod damaged his hearing.
>
> Steve Dowling, an Apple spokesman, said he had no comment on the Zogby
> poll,
> conducted Feb. 20-22.
>
> The two lawmakers who appeared at Tuesday's news conference--Reps. Edward
> Markey (D-Mass.) and Mike Ferguson (R-N.J.)--did not seem intent on a
> legislative fix.
>
> Seeming to wax nostalgic, Ferguson said, "Listening to music that annoys
> parents at incredibly high volumes is a rite of passage for kids of any
> generation."
>
> But he put much of the onus on parents. "As parents, we talk to our kids
> about looking both ways before crossing the street," he said. "We talk to
> our kids about not talking to strangers. We also need to talk with them
> about the lifelong damage that could be caused by misusing personal music
> devices."
>
> Markey said he plans to work with Ferguson to press the industry and the
> National Institutes of Health for more research on the role portable media
> devices play in hearing loss and solutions.
>
> The experts also warned that no one should take hearing loss lightly, that
> it can have major consequences, even when it is seemingly only minimal and
> particularly when it occurs in children.
>
> Anne Marie Tharpe, a hearing and speech sciences professor at Vanderbilt
> University, said research indicated children with such deficits were
> "failing in school at a rate of 10 times their peers.
>
> "My point is that minimal hearing loss is not inconsequential for these
> children," she said.
>
> ----------
>
> fjames at tribune.com
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Copyright (c) 2006, Chicago Tribune
>
>
>
>
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