Can Wearing Headphones Damage my Child's Hearing?

Ah! The unparalleled tranquility that means you don’t have to listen to One Direction anymore. Headphones do bring some welcome peace and quiet to your household and most teens enjoy listening to music on their smartphones, but when music is played too loudly through headphones, it can result in permanent hearing loss.

According to a study by the Journal of American Medical Association, hearing loss in teens is “30% higher than it was in the ’80s and ’90s”. The study estimates that about 1 in 5 (that’s 6.5 million) US teens suffer some hearing loss from listening to loud music on their headphones.

While you may feel like your hearing is being damaged when your children turn up the volume, you are far safer than when music is played loudly through a headset. The proximity of the transducers to the eardrums is what poses the danger here. Hearing is made possible by tiny hair cells in the cochlea that convert vibrations into electrical signals that travel to the brain. These tiny hairs naturally die out as we age, but can be permanently damaged by too much vibration.

Loud music (or other noise) can result in two kinds of damage. Sensorineural damage occurs in the inner ear when hair cells are negatively affected by loud noises. Each group of hair cells is used to hear a particular frequency of sound. When they die off, that frequency can no longer be heard. High frequency hair cells are the most sensitive and they are the first to succumb to damage. This means that most adults can’t hear frequencies between 3 kHz and 6 kHz.

You can test which frequencies you can no longer hear by following this link. http://digg.com/video/how-good-is-your-hearing.

Tinnitus is a more serious condition in which the hair cells suffer permanent damage. Here the hair cells register vibrations even if there is no sound which results in a persistent buzzing sound.

How loud should headphones be?

Here are the recommended daily doses of sound that the ear can safely manage.

90 dbA  8 hrs

92 dbA  6 hrs

95 dbA  4 hrs

97 dbA  3 hrs

100 dbA 2 hrs

102 dbA 1.5 hrs

105 dbA 1 hr

110 dbA 0.5 hr

115 dbA 0.25 hr or less

Encourage your children to practice caution when they are playing music loudly. While it may be okay for very short periods of time, it could result in damage or permanent hearing loss. Listening to loud music while walking, biking or driving can compromise your ability to pick up dangers in your surrounding environment.  As a general rule, advise your kids to always keep volumes below 70%.

 

Testimonial -

“My son was very frustrated in math. He was really falling behind and he had developed quite a negative attitude towards his math. As a last resort, we decided to try a tutor. I was a little skeptical but we have been very pleased! I wish we had called your service a lot sooner. Our tutor is so patient, knowledgeable and extremely helpful. I love how he goes through my son's math assignments and teaches him all the basics that he sees my son is missing in order to properly complete his homework. My son's math mark has improved dramatically. Most importantly, my son has started to enjoy math and I've heard from his teacher that he is participating in class and is very proud to share what he has learned from his tutor during math class. Thank you.” - Parent of Ethan, Grandview High School, Aurora

Choosing the Right Tutoring Program will Ensure Success

It’s back to school now for millions of students and vicariously for their parents. And as they hit the books, virtually all have the same goal: raise grades and test scores substantially to get into a good college and have a chance in an increasingly competitive job market. But the bad news is that many students are falling short of their academic goals.

“Low or failing grades produce shame, frustration, helplessness, hopelessness and peer group rejection,” says Larrie Reynolds, Superintendent of Mount Olive Township Public Schools. “This allows the student to convince even themselves that their lacking success in school is actually a personal lifestyle choice, rather than an inevitable fate.”

The good news is that through an effective tutoring program, students can overcome the academic and resultant social difficulties.

There are many causes of poor academic performance, but it almost always leads to negative consequences for the confidence of the student. “They may be upset with parental pressure, have no strong drive, lack confidence, have learning problems or face other apparent barriers. So to simply start ‘tutoring’ them so often backfires, turning out to be an exercise in futility,” says Frank Milner, president of Tutor Doctor, a global network of academic coaching companies.

“That’s why our academic coaches begin with what our process refers to as a personal discovery. Our people find out what is in the student’s heart and mind before we begin to deal with English, mathematics or history. If we know that there is something working against the learning process, we can address it quickly and effectively,” says Milner.

As an example, we look at a sophomore in High School and a competitive swimmer who failed most of his classes during his freshman year. Family stress reached a boiling point and his parents reached out to a tutor for help. Sophomore year, the student went through the personal discovery process and was seen by an academic coach for both English and Math. The student proceeded to get A’s and B’s and his parents couldn’t be happier.

The personal discovery looks for five key issues that can be blocking the student’s academic success:

• Working parents have little time to help students with academics.
• Students that “struggle in silence.” These students are too embarrassed to reach out for help at school.
• Too many extra-mural activities impede the student’s ability to perform academically.
• Gaps in educational fundamentals.  These gaps need to be filled in while working on current studies.
• Situations where moving is involved. Moving from state to state, elementary to middle school, middle school to high school, public to private and vice-versa.

“We know that by conducting the personal discovery first and also by filling in gaps in the student’s knowledge before trying to go to the next level, “says James Zazeski of Tutor Doctor, ” our system proves that it is highly effective in accelerating the trajectory of learning.”

“Dakota has only been with her academic coach for two months and already her test scores in grammar, science and history have gone from D’s and F’s to high A’s,” says  Tracy Healey, a Tutor Doctor client. “Your careful selection in matching the right tutor to the student was spot on. Dakota’s confidence level is through the roof and she now feels that she is very capable of achieving great success as a student. As a parent, I’m thrilled!”

- See more at: http://tutordoctorhelpsallage.com

-Follow us on Twitter @tutordoc