The effect of prolonged usage of headsets on hearing efficiency among students at Qassim University

Abstract

The current study aims to determine the effect of prolonged use of headphones on hearing among Qassim University students, to evaluate the relationship between tinnitus and prolonged use of headphones, the different effects of prolonged use of headphones among male and female students and test the hypothesis of the study that there is an increased risk of hearing problems with prolonged use of headphones among students: For this purpose, 368 participants took part in the questionnaire and the highest percentage of the total sample was a user of the headset by 87.2%. Results showed that headphone use negatively affects hearing health. Chi-square results showed a statistically significant association between hearing health and all the following variables: Hearing rates today compared to five years ago, not hearing family or friends well, hearing ringing or whistling sounds in their ears without a source of sound worse, difficulty hearing someone talking in a whisper, take some medication regularly for tinnitus and tell a specialist they have a hearing loss. Finally, the Spearman correlation found a very strong negative statistical relationship between headphone use and the rate of hearing, the more hours of headphone use per day, the lower the rate of hearing.