Worried About Inducing Acoustic Trauma

[Gl0w0ut]

Last week, I was playing a series of pure tones for the purpose of residual inhibition over my car speaker between songs on my mp3 player. My tone volume for the car stereo is 6 while the level for music was 11. I forgot to adjust the volume and has a pure tone blasted into my ear at the painful level of 11 rather than 6. It took me 2-3 seconds to drop the volume. Since then, my tinnitus hasn't been noticeably worse, but I've been getting it in my head that I may have induced hearing loss as a result of that. I am a tad worried about these brief, high decibel intakes of sound destroying more hair cells. I'm already paranoid about using my headphones again, but I need the music to mask the noise when I walk around campus.

At what point is acute high intensity sound exposure ototoxic?

 

[Michael B]

I too have listened to pure tones but always regret it even at a lower volume! To be on the safe side, I'd be just as concerned about the volume of music and continued headphone use. Earphones gave me my tinnitus and now I'm paying for it!