Can Hearing Loss Affect Your Personality?

Do you or someone you care for have hearing loss? You may and not even know it. This is because hearing loss often develops gradually – so subtly that you don’t notice as the subtle sounds of birds chirping or wind in the trees are undetectable. Overtime this can develop into issues with communication and likeliness to try new things. Communication can be exhausting, frustrating and even embarrassing as miscommunications devolve into misconceptions of disinterest and aloofness.  As hearing loss develops, whether you notice it or not, it can affect your personality.

How Hearing Loss Affects Personality

At its most essential, personality is the characteristic patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that make a person unique. This includes how you enjoy interacting with other people, and activities that help you to feel affirmed. As hearing loss affects communication it also affects how you converse, socialize, and stay active. It’s common for the stress of hearing loss to cause individuals to choose to skip social events or even one on one meetings due to the anxiety and exhaustion of struggling to converse with compromised hearing. It also limits the number of activities that a person is willing to do, often leaving active people to a more sedentary life. Overtime it seems that hearing loss’s effect on our choices contributes to our personality.

Researching Hearing Loss and Personality

To solidify this hypothesis, researchers at the University of Gothenburg examined the results of a study of 400 adults in the age range of 80 to 98 years old. They ran a series of short tests to measure physical and mental health on the participants biannually over six years. In addition, they measured personality traits such as extraversion, introversion, outgoingness, and emotional stability.

At the end of the six years, the study identified that many of the participants were less extroverted and outgoing than at the start of the study. They accounted for many of these changes in physical and cognitive health commonly associated with aging, however the only consistent factor in participants with higher introversion at the end of the six years was hearing loss. “Surprisingly, we did not find that declining overall health and functional capacity make people less outgoing,” said Anne Ingeborg Berg, PhD, researcher at the University of Gothenburg. “But hearing loss directly affects the quality of social situations. If the perceived quality of social interaction goes down, it may eventually affect whether and how we relate to others.”

Social Isolation’s Effects on Your Personality

The study from the University of Gothenburg determined that hearing loss was a consilient factor for less out going behavior in seniors. This is particularly of interest due to the prevalence of hearing loss in older populations. One in three people over 65 and one in two over 75 suffer from hearing loss. For the rare seniors who reach 100 there is a 100 percent chance they’ll have some degree of hearing loss. This is due to changes in the inner ear as we age. It’s important to anticipate the likeliness of hearing loss as we age and screen regularly. The sooner we address hearing loss the sooner we can avoid some of the negative side effects such as loneliness, isolation, and depression. Some studies have even identified that even a mild case of hearing loss can increase the risk of developing dementia by 50% latter in life.

Treating Hearing Loss 

If you loved to exercise, build, sing, or collaborate with others in your life it’s all too common that hearing loss can hinder these practices making it less likely for you to do the things you love and connect to the people who matter most to you in life. While socialization is not inherently a personality it does affect your ability to engage in activities that you once enjoyed and connect to people who have meant a lot to you over a lifetime.

While hearing loss is most commonly permanent it can be treated using hearing aids. These tiny electronic devices amplify the specific sound you struggle with based on a hearing exam. This allows you to connect to the people you love and engage in the activities you’ve always loved. If you suspect you are struggling with hearing loss or are reaching an age where it is probable, it’s a good time to act. Contact us to schedule a hearing exam and hold on the parts of your life that makes you, you!