The Study on the High School Students' Use of Earphone and the Evaluation of Their Hearing Level

Choi, Sunhee; Ko, Doheung; Lee, Junghak

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Commun Sci Disord. 2000;5(1): 1-19.

Sunhee Choi^` , Doheung Ko^` , and Junghak Lee^`

최순희(Sunhee Choi)| 고도흥(Doheung Ko)| 이정학(Junghak Lee)

ABSTRACT

Listening to music through earphones or headphones with per sonal cassette player s (PCPs ) is , as a matter of fact , one of the prevalent activities for young ster s everywhere. However , the problem is that it can be responsible for hearing damage of the same nature as that caused by indu strial noise. Con sidering such situation, this study was focused on informing them about th e pos sibility of s er iou s dan ger s of list enin g to amplified mu sic. A total of 275 highschool student s were randomly selected. T he participant s underwent a pure tone audiometric and immittance (tympanometry ) test s. In addition , they were requested to choose a preferred volume levels which set in liquid screen on PCPs to find out the sound level preferred individually . 130 subject s (61.6%) exhibited normal criteria bilaterally from immittance. Pure tone averages of 130 subject s whose hearing levels existed within normal criteria indicated that 15.8 dB HL on left ear s and 14.7 dB HL on right ear s, respectively . Although the hearing thresholds of subject s exposed to amplified mu sic were mostly within normal range, we should take ceaseless care of overu se of PCPs. Because they are still young and the hearing damage due to noise comes insidiou sly . Also, this type of hearing loss becomes obviou s only when sufficiently evolved, i.e, after several year s of exposure. 30 out of 275 subject s were over allowable exposure level according to OSHA guidelines . This can cause a public health problem and give us a reason to conduct the public education of hearing conservation. Under the circumstances, it would be advisable that warning signs of hearing damages should be specified on the surface of PCPs , cas sette tapes or compact discs as warning signs of cigarette and liquor . Education of hearing conservation should be also given in elementary and junior/ senior high schools. T hrough this way , the young ster s hearing health in the future could be protected against further hearing damages.