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Science

Early Blindness Sharpens Sense of Sound 46

Posted by michael from the seeing-isn't-everything dept.
squidfrog writes "Canadian researchers (articles here, here, and here) have released findings that 'compare the hearing perception of people who lost their sight by age 2, individuals who went blind between the ages 5 and 45, and people with normal vision. The test involved listening to a series of two tones. For each set of tones, subjects had to determine whether the pitch was rising or falling.' 'It has long been known that blind people are far better than their sighted counterparts at orientating themselves by sound... this latest research has found that blind people are also up to 10 times better at discerning pitch changes than the sighted, but only when they went blind before the age of two.'"
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Early Blindness Sharpens Sense of Sound More

Early Blindness Sharpens Sense of Sound

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  • the blind.... (Score:1, Funny)

    by karnal ( 22275 )
    I'll also bet that people who are blind aren't likely to attempt to light firecrackers at an early age (12) and have one go off near their left ear, causing tinnitus at that early of an age. They may also not be so inclined to attempt to play live music at such volumes to destroy their ears.

    Of course, my right ear still has no ringing in it (age 29 now), but if I concentrate, I can tell my left ear still rings. There are days I wish I hadn't lit that firecracker... but you only live once!

    • Re:the blind.... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by robochan ( 706488 )
      How the post got marked redudnant is a mystery ;)
      However, have you ever tried white-noise therapy? It does give some sense of 'relief' to the constant ringing sound. Whenever I go to a live show that's especially loud, on the way back, I set the car radio between stations (the static is pretty close to white noise) and it 'counter-acts' the ringing a bit - so much so that it allows those in the car to have a conversation without having to yell. Ocean wave sounds have a simliar effect.

      • Ringing In Ears (Score:3, Interesting)

        by RobertB-DC ( 622190 ) *
        However, have you ever tried white-noise therapy? It does give some sense of 'relief' to the constant ringing sound.

        I'm 37, and just found out this past year (at my grandmother's funeral) why I've always had a clear, pure tone in both ears. When I was 5 months old, a small-town fireworks display went bad, resulting in a huge blast that shook the whole area. I don't ever remember *not* hearing the tone -- I can hear it right now if I focus on it.

        I don't think I'd want the sound to go away. It's my soun

        • Re:Ringing In Ears (Score:2, Interesting)

          by Deflagro ( 187160 )
          That CRT thing is more of a feeling than a hearing tho, I have the same problem. I can hear that noise before the actualy sound on a TV, through walls and all. It's very distinctive. I thought i was the only one that could do that :)
          • No, I have pretty good hearing, and I hear it too. My guess is that it's the high-voltage transformer for the CRT. After a while, your brain filters it out, but if you get closer and move your head, it is clearly there (mute on).
            • I hear it too, I can tell a muted TV is on as soon as I enter a room. The horizontal sync frequency for NTSC is 15.75 kHz, I've always assumed it was coils or deflector plates vibrating at that frequency. I've never personally met someone who hears it, but they may just not have noticed it...normal hearing is supposed to go up to 20 kHz.
              • I can hear it, but I always figure it was something about electronics in general. I sometimes hear it in rooms with TVs turned off.
              • Ya, people would always look at me like i'm crazy. I'd say that a TV is on in that other room, but no one could hear any noise. It's just a high pitched whine, like an electrical sound.
                I just never really thought about it i suppose. Glad to see i'm not the only freak tho ;)

                • I can confirm that I, too, have always been able to hear this, and [so far] still can.... despite my determined efforts as a teen to find the upper limit of volume at which an electric guitar could be played. I used to stick my head right up against the speaker and blast music; I feel so lucky that I can still hear that high-pitched sound TVs make. I do think that I must have damaged my hearing, but so far, I haven't suffered. I do sometimes hear that tone [very rarely] in a very silent setting, and I wond
          • I always find that I cannot hear the high-pitched electronic sound, but I can somehow detect whether a nearby CRT is on or not.
        • I hear the same tone, i think its genetic, we all hear in our own way at are own levels

  • Let's mention (Score:4, Interesting)

    by crmartin ( 98227 ) on Thursday July 15, 2004 @10:33AM (#9707139)
    Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder, because someone has to.

    Really, it's great to have a study that confirms the mechanism, but given the number of brilliant blind musicians, it's no surprise.

    • Re:Let's mention (Score:4, Interesting)

      by bcattwoo ( 737354 ) on Thursday July 15, 2004 @10:48AM (#9707303)
      Really, it's great to have a study that confirms the mechanism, but given the number of brilliant blind musicians, it's no surprise.

      I think that there would be some question as to whether it was an increased sense of hearing that made them great musicians or did their lack of sight motivate them to excel in the art of one of their remaining senses?

    • Re:Let's mention (Score:3, Interesting)

      by robochan ( 706488 )
      Also, I wonder if this has anything to do with the human ability for learning language. Music is considered a language by many people, and a lot of studies show that languages are best learned when the subject is as young as possible. The (supposed?) increase in other senses' abilities when one is lost might also be a factor. By no means do I have scientiffic correlation for this, of course, but there might be something to it.
    • No, I'm pretty sure Sid Vicious could see.
    • Ray Charles (R.I.P.) went blind at the age of seven. This research only finds a result for people who went blind before the age of 2.

      The guy merely had more talent in his little finger than most of today's most popular musicians have in their whole bank of voice sequencers and chorus machines. How boring.
      • Well, Ray Charles was completely blind by 7, but it took some years of increasing blindess to get there.

        But it's not like anyone is claiming that blindness the the only reason Ray -- or Little Stevie Wonder -- was talented.
        • Also, the researchers say their findings indicate the age of two as the cutoff age, so to speak, but hey, it's only research. It's still quite possible that Ray Charles, or any other single human, could have developed similarly to the children studied by these researchers, even at a later age. Just because some researchers didn't find such a result in this study doesn't prove, or even suggest, that it's an impossible result.

  • I was born premature and have impaired hearing.

    My body compensated and now I have an elevated sense of self importance.

  • Not just early blindness (Score:4, Interesting)

    by baywulf ( 214371 ) on Thursday July 15, 2004 @11:01AM (#9707428)
    I once saw a show on Discovery channel (I think it was National Geographic) where experiments were done of braille reading skills. A blind-folded person would asked to read some braille characters using their fingers while measuring activity in different parts of their brain. The part related to visual processing was "quiet" since they were blind-folded.

    Then after many days remaining blindfolded, they were asked again to do some braille reading. The accuracy would improve and amazingly enough the part of the brain related to visual processing would show activity showing it was taking on some new tasks. After this the blindfolds were taken off and after a few hours of rest, the braille reading accuracy dropped and brain activity went back to normal.
    • I have also read that the "brain scans" of blind people when reading braille light up in the supposedly visual part of the brain. Although parts of the brain can be used for things which there weren't "supposed" to be used for, it's likely that what's happening is that the finger nerves rather than the ear nerves are connected to the visual part of the brain. However, that suggests neither that the person is "seeing" braille nor that the part of the brain that got taken over was really rewired (it might jus
  • ...the man without fear.
    That basic idea is the premise of what happened to him. He lost his sight, and it extremely improved his other senses. To put a little comic book spin on it, though, they incorporated the angle that it was some kind of radioactive waste that splashed in his face so that it caused a more extreme heightening of his senses than a normal person.

    • Re:Daredevil! (Score:3, Funny)

      by AuMatar ( 183847 )
      Also th emost useless superhero of all. His special power is that he's a blind man who can see. The two cancel each other out! Its like he's a normal man.

  • adaptations (Score:2, Interesting)

    by EaterOfDog ( 759681 )
    I am a hearing-impared individual who is funcional with hearing aids but basically deaf without. As my hearing has gotten worse, I have found myself making adaptations without realizing it. About a year ago, I realized I was able to identify the people I work with via the vibrations through the floor when they approach. I am not sure how long I have been doing this. I have long been aware of increasing sensitivity in my vision, but my sense of touch??? Freaky.

    • Re:adaptations (Score:2, Interesting)

      by mooncaine ( 778422 )
      I grew up with a grandmother who was totally deaf since some time in her adolescence. She lived most of her adult life in a foreign country, raised 4 children and 2 grandchildren.

      To me, the main disadvantage I could say her deafness brought her was that she never learned to speak English. She could speak Greek so well, and lip-read Greek so well, that people very often refused to believe she was deaf. [I tested whether she could hear an electric guitar amplified beyond my pain threshold -- no dice]. We'd h


  • People who lose their legs early in life have stronger and have more dexterity in their arms than people who don't.

  • Ulysses Everett McGill: I don't know Delmar. The blind are reputed to possess sensitivities compensating for their lack of sight, even to the point of developing paranormal psychic powers. Now, clearly seeing into the future would fall into neatly into that category; its not so surprising then that an organism deprived of its earthly vision...

    (O Brother, Where Art Thou?)

    steve
  • What about blindness which occurs later in life, but is a result of radioactive chemicals [imdb.com]?
  • These are the moments when I wish it were legal and ethical to experiment on humans. I want to know what happens if you temporarily induce blindness (like a permanent blindfold)in an infant so that it develops this ultra-hearing, then afterwards take off the blindfold. Would its hearing still be exceptional? Would its vision be highly impaired from being undeveloped? Since the eyes still technically work, would it develop super night vision?

    Yes, the logistics of this is mind-boggling, as is the thought

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