Lifetime leisure music exposure associated with increased frequency of tinnitus.

The objective measure of speech reception threshold had only a minimal relationship with tinnitus. Self-reported hearing difficulty was more strongly associated with tinnitus, but 76% of people reporting usual or constant tinnitus also reported little or no hearing difficulty. Overall, around 40% of participants of all ages reported never experiencing tinnitus, while 29% reported sometimes, usually or constantly experiencing tinnitus that lasted more than 5 minutes. Together, the results suggest that tinnitus is much more common than hearing loss, but that there is little association between the two, especially among the younger adults disproportionately sampled in this study.
PMID: 27825859 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Source: Hearing Research - November 3, 2016 Category: Audiology Authors: Moore DR, Zobay O, Mackinnon RC, Whitmer WM, Akeroyd MA Tags: Hear Res Source Type: research