John Mellencamp, Daughtry, Bon Jovi and U2?

He's better off deaf.

A simple fix to prevent this? Use foam ear plugs and plain headphones. The ear plugs block out outside noises and allow you to turn up your headphones a little to also block out the outside noises.

The thump, thump, thump and screaming loud noise made by some auto stereos is ridiculous, too!

Hahahahahaha, I am laughing my butt off because I've been predicting this for 16 years! I have been saying for years to invest in the hearing aid industry because it'll be one rolling in money. Just like eyes, damage done to the ears is permanent. I always get highly amused when I hear one of those car stereos so loud that my car is vibrating (which by the way got T-Boned today leaving my car smashed and me and my kids sore as heck).

This isn't news. Around 10 to 15 years ago the AJM (American Journal of Medicine) did an article about the "Deafening of America" on how the kids today growing up will show signs of hearing loss due to technology and music players as well as car stereos. From the iPods, to laptops and stereo systems in cars, weekend clubs sound systems, kids, teens, and young adults will lose their hearing at earlier ages.

Really sad that kids today have access to all this technology and abuse them for their entertainment. Now they are seeing just what the consequences are when you keep earphones stuck in your head all day long.

Parents need to stop buying them al this krap.

My my my aren't we leaving our children a great legacy?

Fat, stupid and hearing impaired.

"Although speech will be detectable, it might not be fully intelligible," he said.

And all these years I thought my teenagers were just ignoring me as usual.

if its too loud you haven't lost your hearing yet.

the good news is the technology allows us sharper and clearer sound at higher decibels than ever before so as soon as you start to lose a little just turn it up!!!

In a recent survey of teen's parents, nearly 100% of teenagers suffer from severe hearing loss...this survey's results are nearly Identical to the same survey conducted over the last Million Years

Exceptional.

I once heard a good rule of thumb: Anything louder than your alarm clock is bad for your ears. That being said, turn down the music in your cars, Ipods and home stereos, eliminate the use of gas powered yard tools and use ear plugs if you have them. Loud exhaust pipes (ineffective mufflers) should be illegal on all vehicles. There is no reason I should have to hear your loud car, pickup truck, or motorcycle half a mile away. Educate your kids on this because most of them are too stupid to know its causing permanent damage. In the next twenty or thirty years we will have a large population of hearing impaired people if something isn't done.

With all the manufacturing jobs dropping off the face of America, how else are people suppose to get tinnitus?

Also those annoying kids installing fart cans to their crappy cars. Woopty do, it makes the car louder..... but its still a crappy car.

Hear hear!

Yes this isn't anything new. I know I did some permanent damage to my ears with my sony walkman 20 years ago, and there were warnings about that back then too.

Charles Janoe

"Earbuds may be blame" wake up and smell the @!$%#. Have you heard the levels of, as they want you to believe its music? I do not believe it is "Earbuds" but the high levels of the sounds around you that causes hearing loss. Just drive down the street and you have car that you will hear three blocks away. or the idiot that you can hear their so called music a block away. I do not know if you know this but there are laws out to stop, or at least turn this loud noises down, but the police will not do anything, or even the parents. They both just look the other way. its someone Else's problem..... Wake up

A neighbor of mine was fed up one early morning when this jerk shows up around 6:30 am from work blasting his truck stereo. He had this large boom speaker set up in the back of the flatbed, then one morning this old black man was waiting for him with a baseball bat and beat the chit out of his truck, the big speaker and broke out his windows and then bashed in his truck stereo and speakers. He came back into the building and back to his condo. Cops arrived and went around and asked all the people if they saw anything and we all said "NO". The police had been called so many times by all the neighbors and the police did squat about it. So it's up to the people to take matters into their own hands and resolve certain situations. In a few weeks, the young, black, jerk with the truck moved out of the neighborhood. He was not missed! Months later the piece of chit was in the LA times, shot and killed by someone, and my guess, he was disturbing their peace and quiet as well. He will not be missed!

DaTroofHurts

Yup. Car stereos are especially troublesome. Just like being on the internet, people in their cars feel invincible and don't care that they wake your baby or rattle your windows. They think it makes them cool. I wish it was illegal - something needs to be done before someone starts shooting at passing cars.

Put lots of sugar in their gas tanks. This will shut them down, and eventually they will get the message.

It should be legal to shoot these people that blast car stereos and have outdoor parties in neighborhoods where others live.

Today, people have no effin respect for themselves, much less for anyone else. I say shoot the ghetto trash and be rid of them once and for all.

I've been saying that for nearly two decades now. Sub-woofers in cars that can be heard and felt three blocks away, sound systems that carry for miles. Anything over 75 decibels is a problem that leads to hearing loss. Too bad OSHA can't put their foot down on these sound systems like some other countries are beginning to do. One Caribbean country (can't remember which one right now) has actually banned auto sound systems that produce over a certain decibel level with heavy fines for the owner of the vehicle, the installer, and the merchant who sold the system. Heavy sub-base not only affects the hearing, but also the body's natural electrical (nervous) system which affects heart rates, etc. Sure wish there would be a study on that effect too (early age heart attacks and other heart problems, etc.)

Anyone else here ever have to walk up to 500 feet in order to knock on a neighbor's door and ask them to turn down their music so that you can sleep? Anyone else get that glass-thumping effect from inconsiderate neighbors?

Yup. Car stereos are especially troublesome. Just like being on the internet, people in their cars feel invincible and don't care that they wake your baby or rattle your windows. They think it makes them cool. I wish it was illegal - something needs to be done before someone starts shooting at passing cars.

I have that type of neighbor. I've found calling the police is more effective. If they want to disturb my peace at 2 and 3 in the morning, I can disturb their peace of mind by sending the cops over while they are so stoned the don't realize how loud the music is.

i have found retaliating with celine dion at 7 am is very effective at getting their attention. if im up at 3 listening to your hip hop crap and have to get up for work your getting up with me and my system will shut down sometime around 10am i think?

who i really feel bad for is the third neighbor. he he he.

Roy Acuff works really well too. The kids that used to gather outside have gone elsewhere.

I remember having a real pain-in-the-arse family that lived in the apartment above me. The music would get so loud I would literally bang on the ceiling with a broom handle. Which, of course, only made them turn it up even more. Finally called the cops. When they showed up to tell them to turn it down, they found that the jackasses had actually laid their speakers face down on the floor. Problem corrected, so I thought. The following evening the same thing went down. Same pair of cops showed up, actually took their speakers and told them they can pick them up in 24 hours from the police station. After that I never had a problem with their music again. After that I was simply tortured with them literally jumping up and down on the floor at all different hours....Became a firm believer in single story dwellings after that.

Knocking on their door and gifting them with a dose of pepper spray would have worked wonders.

Loss of sight? From what, screens? I've been looking at computer or television screens for at least 6 hours a day all through elementary and high school, and at least 12 hours a day every day every summer and weekend throughout and weekdays while I was in college. These days, I work 8 hours a day looking at a computer screen to monitor networks and when I get home I play computer games or browse the internet until I go to sleep.

I have 20/13 vision. When I got pinkeye in boot camp, my vision in the eye that was infected degraded to 20/20. Everything looked quite blurry; I'm not sure how most people put up with vision like that.

Whatever...

@Nobody...Loss of sight from the eyeball shots kids are doing these days. Vodka...right onto the eyeball!

I'm going blind, but it's not from video screens...

Video screen blindness is a real issue, but creeps up slower than loss of hearing from blaring sound systems. I know. I went from near-sighted to far-sighted over the past ten years and now have to use 2.5 reading glasses to do my computer work. I'm a graphic artist part time and used to publish a monthly newspaper.....was sometimes on the computer for 30 hours straight meeting publishing deadlines (shut down the paper 1/08). Oh, getting old is murder on the body, hehe. We never realize how vulnerable we are until it is too late. You can't tell a younger person this though. They never want to believe what the older generation tells them (and this goes on generation after generation.)

@Nobody...Loss of sight from the eyeball shots kids are doing these days. Vodka...right onto the eyeball!

That's a good way to cure pinkeye

Huh? What?

I totally agree. Add in television commercials that are calibrated to be much louder than any show and blast you out of your chair in order to get your attention and the whole nation will be using sign language.

Yes, TV commercials need to be toned down. In movie theaters, you have to drown out the obnoxious idiots who won't shut up or the obnoxious idiots driving by in their cars with the thunder going.

Yep, live next to a main street. House and windows shake 5-10 times a day from cars passing by. Just might buy stock in hearing aid company's, good investment!

Providing they have the hearing left to be an audiologist, right?

...unless of course they have some ear canal earbuds which make it so that no one can hear what you are listen too..with the added bonus of foucsing the decibels to the eardrum better meaning louder music.

Since those are becoming much more prevalent today it might not be the best rule of thumb..esp. for teenagers who are on the front line of the latest tech.

Wonder if combination of increasing ear infections in infants, and high dB levels in homes

with Dyson hoovers and 60-inch TV boomers has any affect on real or perceived autism?

There is a study that autistic kids don't respond to sing-song human voices, only evenly

modulated computer-flattened ones, maybe they have lost their high frequency hearing?

Maybe all they can hear is, 'How's my little (urggllrr), yes you (urggllrr), yes you (urggllrr)!!!

It's actually rather sad. Many issues with hearing are often confused with other conditions. Low grades in school, acting out, and many other behavioral issues are caused by the young child being unable to hear all of whats happening around them. Their frustration builds to the point where they act out or cocoon up leading to a misdiagnosis of autism, anti-social behavior, or other.

There's a great South Park episode ripping motorcycle riders.

I just don't understand why people need to compensate in such annoying ways when a balled up sock in the pants is so reasonably priced.

Hey, it's about time someone mention those idiots on their souped up motorcycles. These tough guys have the hearing of old ladies. They think they're so macho with their leather jackets and tattoos, but they can't hear worth s.h.i.t. Dumb a.s.s's they are. Some motorcycles must be 130 dB.

My, aren't you original. Maybe you should go on America's Got Talent as a comedian; you might win with your original humor.

Obviously you've had a bad experience. This just in: You probably saw a hearing aid dispenser and NOT an audiologist. Big difference between the two. Commission often lines the pockets of dispensers...leading to your perception that "audiology machines" (aka audiometers) don't work. Audiologists require Master's or doctoral degrees. While it is acceptable (although, in my opinion, slightly unethical) for audiologists to earn commission on hearing aid sales, they should be honest about any hearing loss and any expected benefit from amplification. You doubt what they told you regarding your results and their recommendations for you? Get a second opinion from an audiologist who doesn't earn commission and see if they tell you something different.

Totally agree. Doctors of Audiology and Audiologists with Masters follow much more stringent guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of hearing loss as well as a code of ethics than dispensers who are literally salesmen. A second opinion with a certified Audiologist is my suggestion as well.

I am just wondering, what is your idea of real music? I say that all types of music are music. I don't like country & western, but it's still music and very well put together I might add, just not my cup of tea. I like Jazz.

Hi Michael - I like your open mind. I make my living sell high performancce audio and see music lovers bring in all sorts of different things. It's a nice way to exxpand your palette. I like to describe my musical tastes as eclectic; my wife prefers schizophrenic to describe them.

Mike and Rick seem to have lost their way and gotten off the subject. Maybe their music is too mellow.

No, you don't. They just crank up the volume as they go deaf. They will crank it up and leave it there because they don't hear it. It doesn't bother them, so what are you getting bent out of shape about. And going deaf does not bring out their consideration towards others, but it does bring out their outrage that you aren't more considerate about their hearing difficulties. (Not in all cases, but in many.)

Ash is right and you're a phoney away out in left field.

What planet are you on"

Truth hurt Jr.?

I am seventeen but I don't drink, I don't have a tattoo, and I don't know what VD is.

Another off the track pol- basher. Go away BobMiller!