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What do you use your earbuds for? While the obvious answer is to listen to music or to watch your favorite videos without waking up the person sleeping next to you, don't underestimate your tiny friends! Nowadays, earbuds can do much more than that.
Earbuds That Act Like Hearing Aids
Companies are constantly trying to push the boundary and enhance the listening experience. One of the newest breakthroughs in this endeavor is a feature called live listening, which is quickly gaining popularity.
Earbuds that have this feature are able to stream music while also modifying the sounds of the outside world. The key here is that these earbuds have the ability to turn the volume of the outside world up or down. Combined with smartphone apps that can boost earbud capabilities, users have the capability to specifically tune which frequencies they actually hear and to turn some frequencies up or down.
For People with Auditory Processing Disorder
For people who have Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) where certain types of sounds are registered as either uncomfortably loud or impossibly quiet, earbuds like this are game-changers.
APD patients often find the sounds of the outside world that most people are able to ignore to be downright overwhelming, sometimes to the point where leaving a very quiet space is physically and emotionally painful. For people who have autism, APD is very common and they often wear big headphones that block noise.
Earbuds that can manipulate outside noise can potentially allow people with APDs to mute or amplify frequencies for their specific condition.
For On Duty Military Personnel
Considering what these earbuds can do, it is not hard to imagine why the military is interested in this technology. Isolating sounds such as spoken orders on a noisy battlefield while also protecting soldiers’ hearing is a difficult to solve yet important technical challenge.
Currently the military uses a device called Tactical Communications and Protective Equipment to block noise. These are large over the ear headphones that while effective, are also very expensive and often unused due to their bulkiness.
While sound amplifying earbuds are yet to be designed for or tested on battlefields, their potential application is seen as worthwhile from the military sector.
For Veterans
Many soldiers who come back from battlefields experience Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), a mental health condition that's triggered by a terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it. One of the biggest triggers of PTSD is noise: and where noise is a problem, sound modifying earbuds can be the solution. The core function of this tech is to eliminate noise, so there is potential as a practical solution. In addition there can also possibly be a psychological safeguard where they can say, “If I have this tool, I can walk outside and not be afraid.”
Olive Smart Ear Device: A New Hearing Experience with Personalized Sound Settings
Like the earbuds mentioned above, Olive Smart Ear is able to amplify surrounding sounds to assist with hearing. Used together with the designated smartphone app, the Olive Smart App, you can test your hearing and have the audio and equalizer frequency personalized to your unique hearing within 5 minutes.
If you are a busy person always on the move who switches between scenes often, you can always choose between modes to immediately adjust the settings to your environment and take calls using the Bluetooth connection with your phone.
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Reminder: Sound Amplifiers Are Not Hearing Aids
Although recent technology has given sound amplifiers new features and increased performance sometimes comparable to hearing aids, remember that sound amplifiers are not hearing aids and are not designed to treat hearing loss. For more information, read our article on the difference between Hearing Aids and other hearing devices.
The information in this guide has been written using the following reliable sources:
https://www.asha.org/public/hearing/Buying-Hearing-Aids-On-Your-Own/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7141988/
https://clearlifehearing.com/blog/could-apple-airpods-pro-kill-the-hearing-aid-industry
