The World Health Organization reports that more than 1.1 billion teenagers and young adults are at risk of hearing loss due to unsafe headphone listening practices and exposure to loud environments. While noise-related hearing loss is common, it’s also preventable.
Let’s take a look at how headphones can put your hearing at risk and what you can do to protect your ears without sacrificing your audio quality.
Use Headphones That Reduce Background Noise
Headphone style plays a vital role in listening safety. Options include over-ear, on-ear, in-ear headphones and earbuds. Each design blocks outside noise differently.
Over-ear headphones typically provide the most sound isolation. When paired with active noise-cancellation, they reduce the need to increase volume to overcome surrounding noise. That means you can listen safely from quiet Evansville parks to noisy breakrooms at work. Earbuds and in-ear styles tend to allow more sound leakage, which often results in higher listening levels.
Choosing headphones that minimize external noise supports safer volume settings throughout the day.
Monitor Your Volume
Even with the right headphones, it’s still crucial to monitor your volume. Smartphones and audio devices can reach sound levels that exceed safe limits. The higher the volume, the shorter the safe listening time. Sounds around 80 decibels (dB) are typically safe for up to 40 hours a week, but exposure at 100 dB can cause damage in as little as 20 minutes.
Using built-in safety features, such as volume warnings and maximum volume limits, reduces the risk of accidental overexposure. Check your smartphone’s headphone safety or audio settings for a volume limit feature and set it no higher than 80 dB. Volume caps are great for minimizing your children’s exposure to loud noise and also help prevent you from raising the volume past safe limits in busy environments.
Take Breaks
In addition to lowering the volume, it’s also crucial to take breaks. If you wear headphones most of the day, schedule breaks where you take them out. You can switch to a small speaker at a low volume if you don’t want to pause your music.
Headphone safety is one of the number one things you can do to protect your hearing in the long run. For questions about hearing loss prevention, contact Hearing Healthcare Center, Inc. to schedule an appointment with one of our trusted specialists.