 Now hear this, your projector sound level should be set so that the following long count is at normal room volume. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. See what day it is? It's probably over at three in the morning. Okay, so get it. See you in the living room later. Now, what? What's the end of the day? I'll tell you what. How about word association? Word association? Okay, like what? Oh, wait a minute. Let me get rid of something for the time being word association. Like if I said red, what is the first word that might pop into your head? A navy. A navy? Well, that's interesting. I bet you could guess who I work for, huh? Let's move on. What about the word arm? Um, uh, hand. Legs. Legs, uh, feet. Head, uh, you repeat each word after I give it to you. I don't know. Habit, I guess. Maybe I want to make sure I heard you right. Do you do that often? I mean, when people are talking to you. Gee, I don't know. I never really thought about it. So what I think we ought to do first is go over to Mallinger's and get Janet a pair of play shoes. She's gone clean through another pair. Oh, she probably needs a pair for dress up, too. Huh? Janet's shoes. She needs a pair of play shoes. Shoes? Oh, yeah. Janet's shoes. Honestly, Harry. Oh, well, that's simply a question of not paying attention. I mean, you know, you mind wanders. You get thinking of other things. Uh-huh. I see. Well, do you mind if we move on with one or two more association questions? Move on? No. I've got nothing else to do. Head. Head, uh, let's see. You asked me that before. How come you seem to know what I'm going to say next? I mean, that's the feeling I get. I'll explain later. There is a reason. Yeah? Uh, head. Tails. I don't know, Harry. I was thinking in another direction. Well, what direction? I mean, you asked me to think of the first thing that popped into my head, right? That's right. The first thing that popped into your head. Mmm, games. Uh, it's not a game, Harry. We don't have to go on. We can quit right here if you want. No. No. Now you've got me interested. But when you say head, that could mean a lot of things. I mean, like a man's head. That's the center of the whole bit. That's where it all happens, right? Yeah. I suppose you could put it that way. It's the center of his thinking. It's where his senses are triggered, you know. His five senses. Yeah. Happy birthday, Daddy. Happy birthday. Thanks, Billy. Happy birthday to, happy birthday... And here, it's touch. And what? Yeah, that's right. You're really the sum total of all you've ever experienced, don't you think? All you've ever seen or heard. Hmm, I'll buy that. Which sense do you think is the most important of all? Which one? Which one do I think? Which one do you think you pay the most attention to? Sight. Yeah, my eyes. I'd have to say my eyes. You know that for sure? Well, take these glasses, for instance. I use these just for reading. My eyes examine once a year. Everybody in my family does. I see to that. I'm the leading chief of a repair department aboard a destroyer tender. I can't do my job without seeing what I'm working on. And I can't supervise anybody on a job like that unless I can show them what to do. And they can actually see the way I want things done. Well, go on. Don't stop now. Well, then, well, we stress eye protection in our shop, too. Most of it's dangerous work as far as the eyes are concerned. There's no way you could do it without being protected. You could lose your eyesight. Hmm, protecting the eyes, huh? Yeah. I'd probably say that's most important of the senses. What's wrong? Do you think I'm that far off? Oh, I don't know. I don't think what you've said is that surprising. A lot of people would probably say the same thing, but... But what? Why don't we go back to that teaching situation you were talking about? And at this time, let's add something that you forgot. It is important to see how others do things. But remember, a lot of our learning is gained from listening, gained from what we hear. We're also at a time when communications, the ability to communicate clearly and effectively, is very important. And the key here is normally the spoken word. But to be of value, the spoken word has to be heard and understood. If it isn't, then you've got a communications problem, a real communications problem. Boy, I didn't realize the noise in there was that bad. And you work in it every day, Harry. Yeah, you're right. And you know, I was straining to hear you. But you're kind of a soft talker. And then that noise hit in there like, wow! Harry, this having to strain to hear, is it an everyday thing? Well, like you said, I work in places where it's hard to hear. That's my job. What about away from work? Think, how about that moment in the car with Beverly? When she was talking about buying Janet a pair of shoes, wasn't there more to it than just repeating yourself? So what I think we ought to do first is go over to Mallinger's and get Janet a pair of play shoes. She's gone clean through her other pair. Oh, she probably needs a pair for dress-up too. Huh? Janet's shoes. She needs a pair of new shoes. Shoes? Oh yeah, Janet's shoes. As you can see, Harry, certain people who have a hearing loss or are beginning to have a hearing problem have to strain to distinguish certain sounds and words that just don't come through anymore. And there are times when a woman's voice may be hard to understand. Oh, that's my main appointment with the government because it's on Monday. No, I was talking with Janet this week for the other day and I don't know. I don't know what that woman was saying. That's fine. That's good. You have to strain to hear, and this can be frustrating. Rather than understanding every word, the person will either guess at what's being said or you will give up trying to understand and just pretend these listening. What he's doing is trying to conceal or minimize the real problem. I guess I don't have to tell you that a lot of warning systems depend on your ability to hear. Well, and what you're saying is I'm going deaf, right? Well, more accurately, what I'm saying is you've probably developed a hearing loss and it will not get any better. In fact, it probably will get worse. It will? Well, what's a hearing loss? Well, you can still hear, but there's something missing, especially at the higher frequencies. Take your stereo set, for example. Lately, you've started turning up the volume to compensate for some of the muffled or distorted music quality, but it hasn't done any good. You see, in cases like yours, raising the volume doesn't clear up the distortion. What you've been hearing is this. What you wanted to hear was this. No, it was that bad. Oh, it has its small comic moments, too. Like this past Thursday. Yeah, that's right. Well, I guess we can get through today's work without too much trouble. We'll finish tomorrow morning at the latest. One way to look at it is to chalk it off as training for some of the newer guys. It'll cause some delay, but... Rain caused any delay. What rain? He just said that rain would cause a delay. I didn't say raining. I said training. What training? The training that... I'll forget it, Harry. The next thing I know, you'll want to know who's on first. Look, if this was all caused by damage to my hearing, how come I've never noticed it before? Because it's an invisible happening, Harry. It happens gradually, over a period of time. Then it doesn't hurt. It's painless. All of a sudden, one day, there it is. And there's nothing that can be done about it. Prevention is the only answer. Well, if it's that serious with me, and I didn't even know about it, it stands to reason a lot of other people have the very same problem. Harry, right now there are an estimated 16 million Americans with a hearing loss directly by excessive sound. Close to 6 million people? No, 16 million. 16 million people? That's right. It's no longer a matter of hearing high-frequency sounds. The damage to their hearing has been so great that even the middle range sounds like the ocean surf have become mushy and indistinct have started to ebb away. Day after day, the feeling of isolation grows. Silence, one so welcome friend, is now a threatening... Couldn't hearing aids help people like that? Hearing aids can help raise the volume, the level of the sound. But if the hearing loss is like yours, Harry, you will still have problems. Hearing aids cannot really replace your own sense of hearing. Well, it's like me turning up the volume on my stereo, huh? That's right. How does a hearing loss come on? How does it start? What causes it? There are many causes of hearing loss. With some people, it's congenital. They were born with it. It can be caused by infectious diseases, the use of certain drugs, or even a blow to the head. But the single largest source of trouble most everywhere, Harry, is noise. Noise? Noise, Harry. Listen to it. You're exposed to it every day. You and thousands of other men in and out of the Navy. Sounds that can hit you when you're not ready. How dangerous are they? Well, it is true that sudden sharp noises can cause hearing damage, but so can exposure to constant noise over a long period of time. Take the constant noise from a ship's engines, for example. They don't seem loud after you've been around them for a while, but they are. The decibel reading inside most engine rooms is high enough to require some sort of ear protection, especially if you're going to be working there for any length of time. Wait a minute. What's this about decibels? What have they got to do with it? They're just units of measurement. Of what? Sound levels? Right. Decibels are used to express the intensity or loudness of sound. The device that's used to make the measurements is a sound level meter. Now, for instance, the 7-inch grinder gets used on just about every ship in the Navy registers between 94 to 97 decibels. A chipping tool can get as high as 100 decibels, considering the fact that any noise above 85 decibels can do permanent damage if you're exposed to it over a period of time. It's no wonder you have a hearing problem. Yeah, well, I don't go around carrying a sound meter with me all the time, and neither can any of my men. We don't have time for that. Oh, I know that. But have you ever had any sound measurements taken in your supervision area to see if they're hazardous? Not since I've had the department. Well, maybe it might be a good idea. Then you'd know what you're dealing with. I guess you're right. Are there any other ways of judging a hazardous area without taking sound readings? Yeah. Yeah, there's one rule of thumb that's pretty reliable. If you have to raise your voice to be understood by a person one foot away, then you're in a hazardous zone, and you and your men should have some kind of protection as a supervisor, you should also be aware of a few other things too. Are any of your men making careless errors in their work? Are any of them often irritated or quick to anger? How about accidents? Is your shop having more than it should? If some of these things are starting to happen, or have been happening all along, they could be due to excessive noise levels. Noise is fatiguing, Harry. Tiring. It can wear you out. Make you careless, and you don't even realize it. It can also cause a ringing in the ears or a muffling of sound. Yeah, I've had that a lot. Normally, your hearing bounces back to normal in about two hours after you've been exposed to any loud continuous noise. Two hours? I've had it stay with me a lot longer than that sometimes. When it stops bouncing back, Harry, and people around you have to speak louder for you to understand them, and music levels have to be raised, and you find yourself straining to hear things that used to come easy. The damage is well underway. Can't your system ever get used to high noise levels? You may think it does, because you get used to it. But you only become hard of hearing, or deaf. The catch is to catch it before it happens. Prevent it. Know that it can happen and do something about it. Well, what is it in the ear that gets damaged? Without getting too technical, let's have a look at the ear. And the sounds that you hear travel along what's called the auditory canal to the eardrum, which is really a stiff membrane. The drum vibrates directly in time with the pressure changes caused by the sound waves. From the drum area, the sound waves are transferred to the small bones of the middle ear. From there, the vibration then moves into a small snail-like structure called the cochlea. Now, this is where the sound damage we've been talking about actually occurs. If we unwound the cochlea and laid it out flat, we would see that as the sound energy enters the cochlea, the basilar membrane is stimulated in this fashion. When greater energy is applied, more undulations result, increasing in size or amplitude. As the sound level increases, this undulating motion becomes more intense, and the area of maximum undulation is where the damage is most likely to occur. Now, if we look at a cross-section, we would see that in the cochlea there are thousands of tiny cells that have hair-like projections. When the basilar membrane on which the hair cells lie is struck by sound, the hairs move in relation to the tectorial membrane. This action creates an electrical charge in the hair cells, which stimulates the nerve endings. These, in turn, transmit impulses to the brain, which are interpreted as sound. If exposure to intense noise continues, these cells become damaged, and a hearing loss results. And no matter how far along the damage is, it's permanent? That's right. Medicine and surgery won't even help at that point. Well, what can I do about it? What's the first step? The first thing you should do is to have the medical department talk to you and your men about noise prevention. Harry, your supervisor of a whole department and the Navy's had a hearing conservation program for years. You just haven't paid close attention to it. As a result, neither have your men. Hmm. I guess not. The second thing you want to do is have the ship's medical department request a noise survey to determine the noise levels in each of your spaces. That way, hazardous areas can be posted, alerting your men and visitors to wear ear protection. Third, it could be that one or two of the machines in your shop are excessively noisy because they're in need of repairs. This is one thing you should look into right away. You don't need a medical team to tell you whether your equipment is working efficiently. And fourth, don't forget hearing protectors, like ear caps and ear plugs. They prove defective in hazardous noise areas. By wearing them when exposed to noise, you can guard against any further hearing loss. Where do you pick them up? They're stalked by your medical department and you can choose the type that suits your job. But you have to go to medical because each ear has to be correctly fitted for them to work effectively. On some jobs where the noise level is especially high, you might have to use ear muffs, the kind that flight deck crewmen wear on aircraft carriers. In some extreme situations, you may require some of your people to wear both ear plugs and ear muffs. Then there's one more thing. You and every one of your men should report to the medical department once a year to undergo audiometric testing. It's the only way to determine whether or not you've suffered a hearing loss. What do you suppose they'd find out in my case? Well, I'm not a doctor, so I can't say. You might have lost your ability to hear some of the higher frequencies, but right now, right now at this moment, the most important thing for you to do is save whatever hearing you still have. Chances are... Chances are what? Hey, hey, I can't hear you. What's this noise? Don't tell Daddy Supper's ready. Okay. What is this anyway? Where am I anyhow? Daddy. Daddy, come on to Supper. Daddy, come on to Supper. All right, honey. Are you awake? Yeah, yeah. I'm okay. Boy, that was some green my hat. Oh, what about? About me and another guy. Only I think the other guy was really me. I mean, like, my subconscious is something. Well, he's convinced me to have my hearing checked. And I'm going to do it. Your hearing, huh? Well, with all that subconscious business, why not your whole head? No, just my ears, just my ears.