The Amazing Ear
“How do we hear sounds? Do I have a hearing loss, if so, how does it affect me compared to someone with normal hearing?” are just a few of the many questions individuals ask when they are told they have a hearing loss. The ear structures are a very complex organ of the human body. There are many mechanisms involved, starting with a sound wave entering the air-filled ear canal, vibrating through the eardrum, traveling its way through the fluid of the cochlea and finally, neurons sending a message all the way to the brain to be processed.
When someone has a hearing loss, one or multiple mechanisms are damaged or absent that it causes a reduction in the sound quality and the ability to understand speech. There are several different pathologies that cause a hearing loss and each person is very different in how it affects him or her.
What is a Sound?
Take a second and listen to the sounds you hear around you. What do you hear? A door opening and closing, a couple having an argument about what is for dinner, a baby crying? All of these sounds are produced by vibrations in varies frequencies that move through space in the form of a sound wave. These vibrations move air molecules in a ripple form like a rock is thrown into a puddle.
Now think about the different pitches you are hearing. Sound waves have varies different shapes and sizes depending on the frequency of the source. What happens when you throw two different rocks that vary in size into the puddle? You get two totally different ripples, right? This is what happens with frequencies. Big rocks or low frequencies create large ripples, and small rocks or high frequencies create small ripples. These frequencies can range from 20 to 20,000 hertz. The most important...
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...s length, shape, hard walls, hair follicles, and cerumen (wax) glands are known to protect the eardrum from any damages that can happen. The ear canal has two bends in the length that will not allow anything to tamper the eardrum on direct impact. The hair follicles and wax glands is the ear canal’s way of cleaning its self. It is not recommended to use a Q-Tip for example to clean out your ears. In time, the hair follicles will push the wax out naturally along with dirt, dead skin or any other unwanted products.
Works Cited
Harris, Tom. "How Hearing Works" 30 March 2001. HowStuffWorks.com. Web. 14 December 2013.
“Types, Causes, and Treatment” Hearing Loss Association of America. Web. 14 December 2013.
Vetter,Douglas. “How do the Hammer, Avil, and Stirrup Bones Amplify Sound into the Inner Ear?” 31 January 2008. Scientific American. Web. 14 December 2013.
A hearing loss can present many obstacles in one's life. I have faced many issues throughout my life, many of which affected me deeply. When I first realized that I was hearing-impaired, I didn't know what it meant. As I grew older, I came to understand why I was different from everyone. It was hard to like myself or feel good about myself because I was often teased. However, I started to change my attitude and see that wearing hearing aids was no different than people wearing glasses to see.
Hearing allows us to take in noises from the surrounding environment and gives us a sense of where things are in relation to us. All those little folds on the outside of the ear, called the tonotopic organization, make it so sound waves in the air are directed to the ear canal, where they can be further processed. Once in the ear, the sound waves vibrate the ear drum, which tell the ear exactly what frequency it is sensing. The vibration of the ear drum is not quite enough to send a signal to the brain, so it needs to be amplified, which is where the three tiny bones in the ear come into play. The malleus or hammer, incus or anvil, and stapes or stirrup amplify this sound and send it to the cochlea. The cochlea conducts the sound signal through a fluid with a higher inertia than air, so this is why the signal from the ear drum needs to be amplified. It is much harder to move the fluid than it is to move the air. The cochlea basically takes these physical vibrations and turns them into electrical impulses that can be sent to the brain. This is...
Sound is localised to the ear by the pinna, travelling down the auditory canal, vibrating the eardrum. The eardrums vibrations are then passed down through the ossicles, three small bones known as the hammer, anvil and stirrup that then transfer the vibrations to the oval window of the cochlea. The cochlea is filled with fluid that when exposed to these vibrations stimulate the sterocilia. This small hair cells "wiggle" along to certain frequencies transferring the vibrations into electrical impulses that are then sent to the brain. If the ear is exposed to noise levels of too high an intensity the sterocilia are overstimulated and many become permanently damaged . (Sliwinska-Kowalska et. All,
serves as a channel for the sound to go into. The sound that you hear travels in vibrations. Those vibrations make the eardrum start to vibrate. When the eardrum starts to vibrate it makes three small bones bump into each other and a signal is sent to the inner ear. The signal is then sent to the cochlea, which is the Greek word for snail. In the cochlea there is a fluid, and from all the vibrations it pushes the fluid through the coil. This then activates the receptor cells or the hair cells to send a signal to the brain.
According to Chapman et al., (2000), the loss of hearing appears to be a chronic issue through...
Hearing loss has a significant impact on a person’ s quality of life. The social, psychological, and physical consequences of hearing loss can take a major toll on a person’s mental and physical health.
The ear houses some of the most sensitive organs in the body. The physics of sound is well understood, while the mechanics of how the inner ear translates sound waves into neurotransmitters that then communicate to the brain is still incomplete. Because the vestibular labyrinth and the auditory structure are formed very early in the development of the fetus and the fluid pressure contained within both of them is mutually dependant, a disorder in one of the two reciprocating structures affects the (2).
momentum transfer when air molecules collide. Our ‘subjective impression’ about the frequency of a sound is called pitch. High pitch has high vibration frequency, while low pitch has a low vibration frequency. A pure musical tone consists of a single pitch or frequency. However, most musical tones are “complex summations” of various pure frequencies - one characteristic frequency, called the fundamental, and a series of overtones or harmonics Younger people can usually hear pitches with frequencies from about 20 hertz (infrasonic) to 20,000 (ultrasonic) hertz. We can’t hear above 20,000 hertz or below 20 hertz (ultra and infrasonic waves).
Deafness can occur at birth or become evident later in a person’s life. Deafness is a disability where a person cannot hear anything through their ear canal. Deafness is incorporated importantly with children because if a child has this disability as a younger age than it attributes greatly to how a child can develop with this disability. Some scientists say that deafness can be lead to genetics while others say that trauma events or exposure to loud noise also have a key role to the cause.
Hearing loss is a major global public health issue. Hearnet (2017) defines hearing loss as “a disability that occurs when one or more parts of the ear and/or the parts of the brain that make up the hearing pathway do not function normally” (para. 1). There are many different types of hearing loss, which can have multiple causes, giving each individual experiencing the issue a unique hearing loss case. These types include Auditory Processing Disorders, when the brain has problems processing sound information; Conductive Hearing Loss, a problem with the outer or middle ear which prevents sound making its way to the inner ear; and Sensorineural Hearing Loss, when the Cochlea or auditory nerve is damaged and cannot
Congenital hearing loss is described as hearing loss that exists at birth. Factors responsible for this condition include those present during pregnancy (such as hereditary factors), as well as factors present after pregnancy. An inherited congenital hearing loss could be conductive, sensorineural, or even a combination of both. The amount or progression of this type of hearing loss varies according to each individual’s case. According to Richard Smith, congenital hearing loss is “syndromic (associated with malformations of the external ear or other organs or with medical problems involving other organ systems) or nonsyndromic (no associated visible abnormalities of the external ear or any related medical problems)…” Over 400 genetic syndromes are associated with congenital hearing loss. These include Treacher Collins, an autosomal dominant disorder and Down syndrome, an x-linked hearing loss. Although congenital hearing loss can be difficult to live with, hearing aids, surgery, and therapy are all available as forms of treatment. Hearing loss must be treated as soon as possible to prevent as many delays in the child’s language development as possible.
Each of the senses receives a different stimulus that allows us to perceive that specific type of information. For hearing the stimulus is sound waves. These are waves of pressure that are conducted through a medium (Martini, 2009). Often this medium is air but it can also be water or a solid object. Each wave consists of a region where the air molecules are gathered together and an opposite region where they are farther apart (Martini, 2009). A wavelength is the distance between either two wave peaks or two wave troughs. The number of waves that pass through a fixed reference point in a given time is the frequency. High pitch sounds have a high frequency where as low pitch sounds have a low frequency (Myers, 2010). The amplitude is the amount of energy, or intensity, in a sound wave. The more energy that a sound wave has, the louder it seems. For us to perceive any of the sound waves around us, they must pass through the external, middle, and inner ea...
The current hypothesis is that one of my genes is a mutated gene, that mutated gene is what is causing my hearing loss. If this is the real reason why I have hearing loss, there is also worry for what other problems does this mutated gene cause. With finding a mutated gene, they will most likely be able to predict how much worse my hearing will get. Another possible but not likely cause is a tumor, currently, I have to get an MRI to make sure that there is no growth inside of my head. If there is a growth, that will lead to some serious issues. The last possible cause is that loud noises have damaged my hearing, but it is even more less likely than a tumor. I am almost never exposed to loud music, concerts, or anything of that nature, which would causes hearing loss. Since I've been losing hearing since I was 5, they have practically ruled that one out because it makes no
The External or Outer Ear - comprises of the auricle or pinna which is the fleshy part of the outer ear. It is cup-shaped and collects and amplifies sound waves which then passes along the ear canal to the ear drum or tympanic membrane. The rim of the auricle is called the helix and the inferior portion is called the lobule. The external auditory canal is a carved tube and contains a few hair and ceruminous glands which are specialized sebaceous or oil glands. These secrete ear wax or cerumen. Both the hairs and the cerumen help prevent dust and foreign objects from entering the ear. A number of people produce large amounts of cerumen, and this sometimes cause the build up to be impacted and can bri...
What distinguishes sound waves from most other waves is that humans easily can perceive the frequency and amplitude of the wave. The frequency governs the pitch of the note produced, while the amplitude relates to the sound le...