Going out for a burger at Cherry Cricket with your friends is a sure-fire way to a tasty, washing-the-dishes-free evening. However, if you have hearing loss, you might find it’s more noticeable in restaurants than in other places, like your home or work.
Sound Fusing in Restaurants
Many people first notice that they have hearing loss when they’re in a restaurant. That happens because restaurants are full of distracting sounds like clattering dishes, tons of other diners and possibly even some music. When you’re at work or home, those sounds are either missing entirely or present on a much quieter scale.
A study from the Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology found that, when you live with hearing loss, your ears are more likely to fuse sounds in environments with competing noises.[1] For example, similar-sounding words like “fifty” and “fifteen” may be indistinguishable. The more advanced your hearing loss is, and the louder your environment, the less alike words have to be for your ears to fuse them.
Restaurants create the perfect environment for that fusion to occur. All the competing sounds can make it difficult for you to focus on and process the speech of a single person, let alone a group. Unless you work in a particularly noisy environment or you attend a lot of parties, restaurants are likely to be one of the first places you notice hearing loss.
What To Do When You Notice Hearing Difficulties
It’s easy to brush off the fact that you struggle to hear in restaurants. Many are more likely to focus on the fact that the restaurant is noisy, rather than the fact that their ears might be having more difficulty understanding speech than they should. But the truth is that trouble hearing in restaurants is likely only one of the signs of hearing loss. Consider if any of the following other signs apply to you:
- You turn the TV or radio up higher than is comfortable for others
- You often accuse others of mumbling or have to ask others to repeat themselves regularly
- You have trouble understanding speech when you aren’t facing the speaker; talking on the phone is more difficult
- Children sound less clear
- You feel exhausted after social gatherings
If any of the above signs sound familiar, it’s time for a hearing test. Contact Advantage ENT & Audiology to schedule your test with one of our specialists. If you need hearing aids, we’ll fit you with the perfect devices.
[1] Glyde, H., Cameron, S., Dillon, H., Hickson, L., Seeto, M., & Goldsworthy, R. (2021). The effects of hearing impairment and aging on spatial release from masking. Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology, 22, 493–507. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10162-021-00790-7