How Music Can Strengthen Your Hearing

If you ever talk to your hearing instrument specialist about music, then you’re likely to get a warning about how listening to music too loud can be bad for your hearing. That said, the impact that music can have on your hearing isn’t all negative. In fact, there is increasing evidence and use of music that can aid, strengthen and otherwise improve your hearing. Here, we’re going to be looking at how music can play a more beneficial role in your hearing health journey than you might have thought before.

Helping you Listen

Sometimes, a person may present with some of the issues that an individual with hearing loss might experience, but we may find that they don’t technically have any hearing loss. In these cases, it is possible that an individual’s listening skills might not be as good as they should be. This can be just as detrimental to communication and environmental perception.

As such, there are hearing health specialists who have started to make use of music to help improve a patient’s listening skills. Music-based therapy can allow a hearing instrument specialist to test whether a patient is accurately hearing the specifics of the music that they’re listening to. Practicing the skill can start to improve that individual’s listening abilities, too.

Improving the Brain’s Ability to Process Sound

Music is good for your brain in a lot of ways, making music therapy and active listening well worth practicing. Of course, music can improve your mood and help you treat feelings such as stress and anxiety. Music also exercises the auditory, multi-sensory and cognitive parts of the brain, which can help it stay sharp for longer. One of the problems that can affect those who experience hearing loss, and even some people who do not listen as well as they should, is that their brain becomes used to not picking up certain sound signals. When this happens, the brain can start to fail to recognize sound signals. As such, even if your ear can hear the sound, the brain can’t process it.

Improving Your Speech Recognition Abilities

If you find that you have trouble understanding speech, this is a very common early symptom of hearing loss. But listening to music can help, even if it seems like there aren’t too many similarities between speech and music. There are fluctuations in the tone and rhythm of both of them. Becoming an active music listener and being able to pick out those fluctuations can help you start to do the same when you’re talking to people, which can be especially helpful when you’re talking to people in noisy environments. Additionally, listening to music can help improve your short-term memory and might even help you better read lips by combining audio and visual stimuli.

Helping You with Hearing Loss

Listening to music can be of specific help to those who are experiencing hearing loss, as well. If you have recently started using a hearing aid, then your hearing instrument specialist will recommend that you get used it slowly, over time, by wearing it in different environments with different levels of background noise. Exposing yourself to new kinds of sounds when wearing a hearing aid can help you improve your hearing and get acclimated to the device more quickly, and listening to music can be one of the exercises you use to do just this.

If you experience hearing loss, you might also occasionally have feelings of stress related to the trouble with communication that can come with the condition. The stress-busting effects of music might well help you deal with that, too.

Don’t Listen to Music Too Loud

Hopefully, the points above have shown just how beneficial listening to music can be when it comes to your hearing health. However, you shouldn’t ignore the potential harm of listening to music at too high a volume. If you’re listening to loud music, especially on headphones or earphones, it can increase your risk of permanent hearing loss. As such, never turn your music up too loud and, if you go to a concert, make sure that you wear hearing protection to ensure the best care for your ears.

Learning More About the Benefits of Music

If you want to know more about the ways that music can improve your own hearing health, or how else your hearing instrument specialist can help improve your quality of life, then don’t hesitate to get in touch with us. You can reach the team at the Center for Better Hearing at 510-768-7091. We’re always happy to help.