If our ears work by their ability to receive detect and interpret vibrations, why does my music sound louder in the morning or before I go out and do something but later, at the same volume levels, it sounds much quieter?
And if this is a bodily response to adapting to loud sounds we encounter, why can’t we “adjust” volume manually ourselves?
In: Biology
It is likely to be a brain and instinctual mechanism from our evolutionary past. In the wild, it is UNUSUAL noises that alert an animal to danger. The brain can only focus on a few things. If it tried to process every sound at “equal” priority, it would risk missing out on the important ones.
In a super low background noise environment (google anechoic chamber) a person can even start hearing their heartbeat and blood flowing in their ears. This is your brain adapting its perceptive resources on the critical stuff. You don’t want to hear the wind blowing on leaves if it means not hearing a predator coming to get you, basically.
Even sight works in a similar way. Many animals detect motion much better than they can perceive still objects. Again, this is the way brains work to improve survival.
This is actually REALLY cool and well worth a deep dive if you can be bothered.
Like, in the day in an office, the clock will be silent. But when you’re working late on your own, it’ll be deafening.
Your ears work on a logarithmic scale, which means that sounds that are 10x louder, only sound twice as loud. Which is an interesting thing.
Your ears also only compare different sounds, depending on what they detect. So if it’s quiet, quiet sounds will seem loud. If its loud, you can even not hear loud things like a car alarm.
Basically, the sounds of everything you hear, sound loud or quiet depending on the background noise.
It’s also why you can get used to living in the front bedroom in a city apartment right on a major road, the noise becomes background noise in the end. Where if you live in the country, one car starting could wake you up.
Latest Answers