Loud Music from Night Clubs and Hearing Damage

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Amplified music from night clubs can lead to hearing damage
Shifts in hearing thresholds can result in excessive exposure to any kind of sound. It not matters whether the sound is pleasant or not nor the music genre, the degree of noise induced hearing loss (NIHL) depends on the intensity and frequency characteristics of the noise, along with its duration and the intermittency of the exposure. Individual genetic and environmental factors also play important part(Bovo, Ciorba, & Martini, 2007).
Hetu and Fortin (1995) studied the characteristics of highly amplified music in discotheques from psychoacoustic and phenomenological points of view. They found that the amplified music is characterized by strong pulsations (≈ 2 Hz), a narrow dynamic range and sloping spectrum with maximum energy in the 1/3 octave centred at 63 Hz. This spectrum, according to Hetu and Fortin (1995), is matching the free field threshold curve elevated by 80 dB. Temporary threshold shift (TTS) can be easily predicted. TTS can be seen as a slow trend of the start of a permanent hearing damage(Dobrucki, Kin, & Kruk, 2013).
Exposure to loud noise damages the Organ of Corti within the cochlea and subsequently leads to an elevation of thresholds. There are two types of damage. An immediate permanent hearing loss can be the result of a very short exposure to an extremely loud noise more than 140 dB. This sound energy can cause a large vibration and detachment of the basilar membrane, the as middle ear structuremay also be involved which lead to additional conductive losses(Clark & Bohne, 1999). Compared with the second type of damage, this kind of insult may be more likely to affect the supporting structures in the organ of Corti, Reissner’s and tectorial membranes....

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