Scientists say there's a dimmer-switch in the brain that tells the ears to slow the flow of signals when hearing becomes difficult because of outside noise. That prevents distortion, like you would hear when a radio is turned up too loud. That circuitry begins to fail with age and Robert Frisina of New York's University of Rochester is trying to figure out why.
Frisina and his fellow researchers published material about the so-called cocktail party problem
about 6 years ago that showed the drop off begins to happen between the ages of 38 and 52. It becomes much worse in people past age 62.
Frisina hopes to use mice that are genetically altered mice to explore evidence that problems in this wiring harm the inner ear. He hopes to find a way to intervene to slow down the age-related hearing problem.
