How does hearing work?
Every source of sound produces vibrations that cause sound waves in the air. These are “funnelled” into the ear through the auditory canal to reach the eardrum, making it vibrate. These vibrations travel through delicate ossicles in the middle ear, which redirect the vibrations to the inner ear. There, hair cells convert them into an electrical signal that is sent to the brain. The brain perceives this as sound: music, a voice, a door closing, etcetera.
Sounds that are too loud can cause the hair cells in the inner ear to become overloaded and die. The longer the exposure and/or the more the noise increases, the more hair cells will die. As the number of hair cells decreases, so does the ability to hear. Dead hair cells cannot be brought back to life, which means that this damage is
irreversible!
