Simulations can be helpful not only by developing empathy and understanding for people with hearing loss but to give people more of an understanding of the consequences of not protecting their hearing, writes Dr. Laura Sinnott, Tuned’s head of product.
Trying to simulate how someone with hearing loss truly perceives the sonic world is not trivial, and I must offer a disclaimer that since I do not have clinically diagnosable hearing loss (most definitely have some hidden hearing loss, however), it is more difficult to assess the accuracy of these simulations.
We all know someone who likely has hearing loss, and what do we do? Raise our voices. Sometimes that helps, but often it doesn’t. The reason is that everyone’s hearing loss is different.
A common type of hearing loss is loss of high frequencies — or treble, or high-pitched sounds like “sh,” “s,” “t,” etc.
When people have high-frequency hearing loss, often they hear low frequencies normally, or even louder than normal. So raising our voices often makes things more distorted. Enunciating and speaking more slowly can be the better tactic.
The way loudness is perceived can also change. A normal-hearing person usually perceives sound in a range — from “really quiet” to “medium” to “really loud.” People with hearing loss sometimes perceive loudness differently, and to make it even more complex, for some sounds but not others.
Listen to the samples of speech with a kitchen vent fan in the background. One is not processed with any audio effects, and the other simulates someone with moderate high-frequency hearing loss. In a nutshell, I reduced the high frequencies and distorted the low frequencies a little bit.
Normal
Moderate High-Frequency Hearing Loss
Corresponding Audiogram
