Study: Some Teens Increase Volume When They Should Turn it Down
February 19, 2009 by Rico Mossesgeld
Filed under Portable Audio, Trends
My way or the highway! “A substantial percentage” of teens reflexively increase the volume of their portable media players when faced with “pressures” to turn the sound down, according to a pilot study conducted within downtown Denver:
The pilot study asked 29 teens in the Denver metro area a series of questions about how they used their players, as well as their susceptibility to hearing loss and if they believed a decrease in volume meant a decrease in music quality.
The participants were then asked to adjust their listening levels to their typical volume and those levels were measured with and without the presence of background noise, said Cory Portnuff, a CU audiologist and doctoral candidate who conducted the study.
“We found some relations between the survey answers and participants that listened louder,” Portnuff said.
Interestingly enough, Portnuff said, the teens in the survey who indicated the most concern about hearing loss from iPods played their music louder than their peers.
Results generated from 29 people are in no way definite, but it does reflect a common attitude: I want to do it this way!
Thanks Matt!
