Pittwater Life December 2018 Issue

Health & Wellbeing
Vital role the brain
plays in our hearing
Health & Wellbeing
Ever wondered where the term “selective
hearing” comes from? It’s probably a
reference to the involvement of our brain in
hearing.
“The ear detects sound, the auditory nerve
transmits sound, and the
brain perceives sound,”
explains audiologist
Emma van Wanrooy from
Pittwater Hearing who says
understanding how the
brain is involved in hearing
can help us to understand
hearing disorders and how to
treat them.
“The brain uses
information about the
relative location of speech
versus the noise to help
focus on the speaker that
we want to listen to in a
noisy situation,” said Emma.
“It also performs a filtering
process by comparing the
noise detected by each ear,
to filter out the noise and
‘boost’ the voice we want
to listen to.” She adds that
people who have normal
hearing but difficulty hearing
in noise, may have what is
known as an Auditory Processing Disorder.
On filtering unimportant sounds, she said
that if we were consciously aware of every
sensation that was picked up by our bodies all
the time, we would be completely overwhelmed.
“Therefore, the brain makes decisions about
what we need to be made consciously aware
of,” Emma said. “We are not conscious of the
sensation of our clothes on our skin all the
time – just as we are not always conscious of
sounds that are constant or normal, like an air
conditioner, or the fridge humming. Our brain
knows they are unimportant, and doesn’t draw
our consciousness to them.” This also explains
how we can sleep through noise at night, but a
mother will always be woken by their sleeping
baby. “Our brain knows this
is an important sound that
we need to be made aware
of… likewise, we will often
notice our name being called
even when in a different
conversation in a noisy
party.”
Have you ever noticed a
ringing or buzzing in your
ears? This can often happen
when you are in a very quiet
room, or after a loud music
concert.
“For most people, this is
only a temporary noise and
disappears quickly, but for
some people it can become
an issue known as tinnitus,”
said Emma. “It is commonly
theorised that tinnitus is
the brain’s reaction to an
absence of sound.”
She said the good news
is the brain has been found
to be very adaptable and
trainable – it is possible for the brain to change
the way it processes sound.
“There are brain training programs that have
been found by research to remediate Auditory
Processing Disorders in children,” Emma said.
“The brain can learn to use the sound from a
Hearing Aid or Cochlear Implant to hear well in
most situations. The brain can also be trained
to not pay attention to Tinnitus.” – Lisa Offord
* More info email Emma at info@
pittwaterhearing.com.au
56 DECEMBER 2018
The Local Voice Since 1991