The Effects of Noise Pollution
Here is an important part of noise pollution (well everything in this website is really, but this part is especially important!). Let’s all face it: we are all affected by noise pollution, almost always in many ways and forms (if not almost always, then we are affected every second of our lives!)
As many as 10 000 000 Americans have lost a part of their hearing as a result of their noisy lives. People that live at airports are especially at risk. One study shows that half the people working at or near the airport runways suffer some hearing loss. Scientists also studied people that were working at a paper mill in India. The noise intensities ranged between 80-100dB the whole day. When the workers were tested, over one third of them showed a sign of hearing loss. Likewise, in Germany, citizens and companies spend approximately four billion dollars per year on correcting hearing problems.
Germany, India and America aren’t the only countries affected. We are constantly experiencing loud noises in school and in the park. Because of this, I will bet all my money that you have lost some sort of hearing. Hearing loss occurs so slowly that we normally don’t even notice. By the time we do, it’s just too late. Hearing loss normally occurs from mechanical noises because our ears weren’t designed to withstand the unnatural noises us humans produce. Thus meaning that most people are affected by noise exposure more than any other environmental stimulus.
I said on the website’s mainpage that noise pollution could cause an affect on psychological wellbeing, cardiovascular disease and difficulty understanding speech. Here I will show you the other daunting (and not so daunting) effects. Noise Pollution, at the minimum, causes annoyance. It mainly causes an individual’s quality of life, disturbance of their sleep, psychological wellbeing and yes (again), cardiovascular disease. On a larger scale, hearing issues or loss are permanent. Noise hurts the ear by flattening the tiny hairs that send noise information to the brain. They are situated in the cochlea.
Ringing in the ears or difficulty hearing after a really loud sound is called a temporal threshold shift. Effects from a temporal threshold shift should go away after a few seconds (or minutes) depending on the damage done to your ears. But if you are wondering when you need to visit a G.P. about your ears, you should look out for the warning signs. These include: tinnitus (the ringing of the ears), a slight muffling of speech and difficulty understanding speech.
Annoyance & Quality of Life:
Above all, noise is a subjective experience. It will cause an annoyance to the source of noise. This effect is very common. To the human body, noise is normally perceived to be an avoidable form of harm and an intrusion to privacy that creates unhappiness. A common form of annoyance, transport noise, (yes, we have all wanted to blow up the annoying garbage truck) is associated with productivity losses and can also cause the inability to work and tiredness caused by disturbed sleep.
Sleep Disturbance:
Insomnia or Sleep Disturbance caused by noise obviously affects the quality and quantity of sleep. Any noise above 55dB affects sleep. The individual may have difficulty getting to sleep, awakening and have alterations of sleep stages or depth. This can result in a reduction of REM sleep (Rapid Eye Movement), which is an increase (throughout the night) of rapid eye movements, more dreaming and bodily movements thus affecting the quality of an individual’s sleep.
Psychological Wellbeing:
Not only does insomnia and broken sleep result in perceived sleep quality, it can increase fatigue, drowsiness, lower an individual’s mood and result in poor performance. Various studies have shown that people living in night-time noisy areas have increased the use of sedatives and/or sleeping pills.
Cardiovascular Disease:
Even more noise during sleep can cause increased blood pressure, increased heart rate, changes in respiration, cardiac arrhythmia (where the heart beats at irregular or abnormal rhythms) and an increase of body movements. Noise affects the cardiovascular system through a stimulation of hormones such as: cortisol, noradrenaline and adrenalin.
Us humans are also really selfish, which I am going to prove to you now. Most of you are probably thinking: “Wow. I need to take great care of my hearing!” or: “Everytime I turn on a home movie, I’m going to always put subtitles on!” when we are hardly at risk at all compared to some animals.
As many as 10 000 000 Americans have lost a part of their hearing as a result of their noisy lives. People that live at airports are especially at risk. One study shows that half the people working at or near the airport runways suffer some hearing loss. Scientists also studied people that were working at a paper mill in India. The noise intensities ranged between 80-100dB the whole day. When the workers were tested, over one third of them showed a sign of hearing loss. Likewise, in Germany, citizens and companies spend approximately four billion dollars per year on correcting hearing problems.
Germany, India and America aren’t the only countries affected. We are constantly experiencing loud noises in school and in the park. Because of this, I will bet all my money that you have lost some sort of hearing. Hearing loss occurs so slowly that we normally don’t even notice. By the time we do, it’s just too late. Hearing loss normally occurs from mechanical noises because our ears weren’t designed to withstand the unnatural noises us humans produce. Thus meaning that most people are affected by noise exposure more than any other environmental stimulus.
I said on the website’s mainpage that noise pollution could cause an affect on psychological wellbeing, cardiovascular disease and difficulty understanding speech. Here I will show you the other daunting (and not so daunting) effects. Noise Pollution, at the minimum, causes annoyance. It mainly causes an individual’s quality of life, disturbance of their sleep, psychological wellbeing and yes (again), cardiovascular disease. On a larger scale, hearing issues or loss are permanent. Noise hurts the ear by flattening the tiny hairs that send noise information to the brain. They are situated in the cochlea.
Ringing in the ears or difficulty hearing after a really loud sound is called a temporal threshold shift. Effects from a temporal threshold shift should go away after a few seconds (or minutes) depending on the damage done to your ears. But if you are wondering when you need to visit a G.P. about your ears, you should look out for the warning signs. These include: tinnitus (the ringing of the ears), a slight muffling of speech and difficulty understanding speech.
Annoyance & Quality of Life:
Above all, noise is a subjective experience. It will cause an annoyance to the source of noise. This effect is very common. To the human body, noise is normally perceived to be an avoidable form of harm and an intrusion to privacy that creates unhappiness. A common form of annoyance, transport noise, (yes, we have all wanted to blow up the annoying garbage truck) is associated with productivity losses and can also cause the inability to work and tiredness caused by disturbed sleep.
Sleep Disturbance:
Insomnia or Sleep Disturbance caused by noise obviously affects the quality and quantity of sleep. Any noise above 55dB affects sleep. The individual may have difficulty getting to sleep, awakening and have alterations of sleep stages or depth. This can result in a reduction of REM sleep (Rapid Eye Movement), which is an increase (throughout the night) of rapid eye movements, more dreaming and bodily movements thus affecting the quality of an individual’s sleep.
Psychological Wellbeing:
Not only does insomnia and broken sleep result in perceived sleep quality, it can increase fatigue, drowsiness, lower an individual’s mood and result in poor performance. Various studies have shown that people living in night-time noisy areas have increased the use of sedatives and/or sleeping pills.
Cardiovascular Disease:
Even more noise during sleep can cause increased blood pressure, increased heart rate, changes in respiration, cardiac arrhythmia (where the heart beats at irregular or abnormal rhythms) and an increase of body movements. Noise affects the cardiovascular system through a stimulation of hormones such as: cortisol, noradrenaline and adrenalin.
Us humans are also really selfish, which I am going to prove to you now. Most of you are probably thinking: “Wow. I need to take great care of my hearing!” or: “Everytime I turn on a home movie, I’m going to always put subtitles on!” when we are hardly at risk at all compared to some animals.