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Bose Hearphones

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Re: Bose Hearphones

#121

Post by didgeoridoo »

randlet wrote: post #101
boobsbr wrote: post #77

Wow, this address a major problem I have. I have decent hearing, but when I'm in a noisy environment like a bar, I can hear but can't understand what other people are saying. It's why I don't like going to bars/pubs with live performances or ambient music. People think I'm bored or brooding because I'm not talking to anyone, but I just can't understand anything anyone says, so I can't participate in a conversation.

Are you sure you have decent hearing? I thought I could hear what people were saying in noisy environments, but couldn't understand anything. This was one of the major symptoms for me before I was diagnosed with moderate/severe hearing loss. It's very isolating. No problems now with a decent set of hearing aids. Have yourself tested! The quality of life improvement from a set of hearing aids is incredible! edit: I wa…

It can also be a neurological or psychological issue. I had my hearing tested after years of being totally unable to pick out voices in a noisy environment. Turns out my hearing is actually above average. My ENT suggested that I might just be "bad at hearing", in the same way that one might have poor memory, or have poor visual-spatial awareness. It's apparently a skill that can be trained.

Re: Bose Hearphones

#122

Post by tibbon »

randlet wrote: post #101
boobsbr wrote: post #77

Wow, this address a major problem I have. I have decent hearing, but when I'm in a noisy environment like a bar, I can hear but can't understand what other people are saying. It's why I don't like going to bars/pubs with live performances or ambient music. People think I'm bored or brooding because I'm not talking to anyone, but I just can't understand anything anyone says, so I can't participate in a conversation.

Are you sure you have decent hearing? I thought I could hear what people were saying in noisy environments, but couldn't understand anything. This was one of the major symptoms for me before I was diagnosed with moderate/severe hearing loss. It's very isolating. No problems now with a decent set of hearing aids. Have yourself tested! The quality of life improvement from a set of hearing aids is incredible! edit: I wa…

I have a similar problem in loud spaces. Given my activities (motorcycling, guitar playing, powertools, etc) I had assumed my hearing was bad, but when I went to an ENT/audiologist for unrelated things I had them give me a good test on a whim.

For me, the results were that I have hearing ability on-par with a ~5 year old, and they only see adults like me every 18 months or so. I've got a printoff of the chart around here somewhere, but it's well outside the normal, especially for my activities.

On the flipside, I'm very ADHD, which I think hurts my loud-space conversational abilities some. I always figure my ears are trying to listen to all of it at once.

(Most lightbulbs and televisions drive me up a wall, because I can hear them all the time)

Re: Bose Hearphones

#123

Post by darrylb42 »

mi100hael wrote: post #89
dawnerd wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should look into something like these instead of regular foam. http://www.etymotic.com/consumer/hearing-protection.html I got a pair for EDC after realizing the foam earplugs were ruining the music. These reduce the volume with minimal muffling. Also pretty cheap considering they'll last a long time. I picked them up at guitar center - they can help you get the right ones.

For those that use earphones a lot at work or on public transit or whatever, I also highly recommend Etymotic's in-ear isolating earphones. They are basically those musician's earplugs with a small driver in the tip. They reduce external noise on-par with foam plugs, so I can listen to my music at much lower volumes rather than cranking the volume of the music to drown out my surroundings. The sound quality is quite…

Shure SE series are good for this as well. Sometimes I just have the earphones in with no music to cut background noise.

Re: Bose Hearphones

#124

Post by steamer25 »

boobsbr wrote: post #77

Wow, this address a major problem I have. I have decent hearing, but when I'm in a noisy environment like a bar, I can hear but can't understand what other people are saying. It's why I don't like going to bars/pubs with live performances or ambient music. People think I'm bored or brooding because I'm not talking to anyone, but I just can't understand anything anyone says, so I can't participate in a conversation.

There's a little bit of a life-hack for this (assuming your hearing really is okay) in loud environments... Push the little flap of the recipient's ear (the flap is called the 'tragus') over their ear canal to seal it off. Then you can lean in and speak loudly enough to overcome the ambient noise without hurting them.

Re: Bose Hearphones

#125

Post by edge17 »

randlet wrote: post #101
boobsbr wrote: post #77

Wow, this address a major problem I have. I have decent hearing, but when I'm in a noisy environment like a bar, I can hear but can't understand what other people are saying. It's why I don't like going to bars/pubs with live performances or ambient music. People think I'm bored or brooding because I'm not talking to anyone, but I just can't understand anything anyone says, so I can't participate in a conversation.

Are you sure you have decent hearing? I thought I could hear what people were saying in noisy environments, but couldn't understand anything. This was one of the major symptoms for me before I was diagnosed with moderate/severe hearing loss. It's very isolating. No problems now with a decent set of hearing aids. Have yourself tested! The quality of life improvement from a set of hearing aids is incredible! edit: I wa…

maybe a dumb question, but how do you get yourself tested? does a doctor have to order tests? is it a self-test?

Re: Bose Hearphones

#126

Post by sophacles »

rl3 wrote: post #93
boobsbr wrote: post #77

Wow, this address a major problem I have. I have decent hearing, but when I'm in a noisy environment like a bar, I can hear but can't understand what other people are saying. It's why I don't like going to bars/pubs with live performances or ambient music. People think I'm bored or brooding because I'm not talking to anyone, but I just can't understand anything anyone says, so I can't participate in a conversation.

Same. I often wonder how bartenders do it. Granted it doesn't stop me from being outgoing, but people having to almost shout or otherwise talk directly into my ear gets old after a while. I suspect it's not an issue with hearing itself so much as the brain processing the information. In quiet conditions I can usually hear whispered conversations a good distance away.

I suspect my experiences bartending lead me to having the problem GP describes. Too much noise over and over... (although the summer jobs working with machinery and not enough ear protection and all the concerts probably contribute too).

But during bartending a few things are true:

* it's not too loud when you have time for a conversation.

* if it is too loud to converse, you're probably busy enough that interaction very simplified to a small subset of language - so lip reading becomes a big contributor to understanding. (e.g. basic greeting scripts, "can i get a..." and so on)

* when it's loud, it's pretty socially acceptable for the bartender to lean in to the conversation to hear - the "personal space bubble" of the speaker tends to shrink in that instance. Similarly a bartender asking you to repeat that a bit louder isn't considered rude.

edit: I wish I was clever enough to say this in as few words as BurningFrog did :)

Re: Bose Hearphones

#127

Post by randlet »

tibbon wrote: post #122
randlet wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure you have decent hearing? I thought I could hear what people were saying in noisy environments, but couldn't understand anything. This was one of the major symptoms for me before I was diagnosed with moderate/severe hearing loss. It's very isolating. No problems now with a decent set of hearing aids. Have yourself tested! The quality of life improvement from a set of hearing aids is incredible! edit: I wa…

I have a similar problem in loud spaces. Given my activities (motorcycling, guitar playing, powertools, etc) I had assumed my hearing was bad, but when I went to an ENT/audiologist for unrelated things I had them give me a good test on a whim. For me, the results were that I have hearing ability on-par with a ~5 year old, and they only see adults like me every 18 months or so. I've got a printoff of the chart around…

Interesting! I can totally see having hyper sensitive hearing being very annoying too. From one rider to another, make sure you always wear hearing protection under your helmet :)

Re: Bose Hearphones

#128

Post by santoriv »

boobsbr wrote: post #77

Wow, this address a major problem I have. I have decent hearing, but when I'm in a noisy environment like a bar, I can hear but can't understand what other people are saying. It's why I don't like going to bars/pubs with live performances or ambient music. People think I'm bored or brooding because I'm not talking to anyone, but I just can't understand anything anyone says, so I can't participate in a conversation.

My mother has this issue (and so do I). Her doctor told her that the problem was a cognitive issue. Apparently some brains have a hard time filtering all of the noise into something we can understand. Have no idea if it's true but seems plausible.

Re: Bose Hearphones

#129

Post by randlet »

edge17 wrote: post #125
randlet wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure you have decent hearing? I thought I could hear what people were saying in noisy environments, but couldn't understand anything. This was one of the major symptoms for me before I was diagnosed with moderate/severe hearing loss. It's very isolating. No problems now with a decent set of hearing aids. Have yourself tested! The quality of life improvement from a set of hearing aids is incredible! edit: I wa…

maybe a dumb question, but how do you get yourself tested? does a doctor have to order tests? is it a self-test?

No not a self test: you need to be tested by a professional. It's done in a sound proof booth using a standard set of tests, including mechanical things like measuring how well your eardrum responds to sound vibrations. I think I pay ~$75-$100CAD per checkup.

You usually don't need a referral as most hearing aid clinics will just let you call up and schedule an appointment. If you want to talk to an ENT specialist though, you'll probably have to go to your family doc first.

Re: Bose Hearphones

#130

Post by skylan_q »

didgeoridoo wrote: post #121
randlet wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure you have decent hearing? I thought I could hear what people were saying in noisy environments, but couldn't understand anything. This was one of the major symptoms for me before I was diagnosed with moderate/severe hearing loss. It's very isolating. No problems now with a decent set of hearing aids. Have yourself tested! The quality of life improvement from a set of hearing aids is incredible! edit: I wa…

It can also be a neurological or psychological issue. I had my hearing tested after years of being totally unable to pick out voices in a noisy environment. Turns out my hearing is actually above average . My ENT suggested that I might just be "bad at hearing", in the same way that one might have poor memory, or have poor visual-spatial awareness. It's apparently a skill that can be trained.

I never thought of it that way but it makes sense. My hearing is fine and I can pick out quiet sounds, far away sounds, high-pitched sounds, etc... But I always have trouble turning the sounds that comes out of people's mouths into words especially if there's other noise. It's not a focus issue, either. I'm probably just bad at hearing speech in those situations for some reason.
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