Age Tougher on Men's
Hearing Than Women's

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Hearing changes come with age, but it seems to happen differently for men and women--possibly leading to communication clashes between the sexes, researchers report.

``For women, it's good news. For men, it's not so good,'' lead author Dr. Teri James Bellis, an audiologist at the University of South Dakota in Vermillion, told Reuters Health. ''Men hit their peak (in sound processing) in their early 20s. From there it's a slow downhill process,'' she said. ``Women maintain their function until postmenopausal years, but then show an abrupt decrease in function.''

Central auditory processing disorders occur when actual hearing ability is unaffected, but the part of the brain that controls processing has suffered damage. Previous research has found that changes in the corpus callosum, the connection between the right and left sides of the brain, play a factor in the decline of auditory processing.

The current study sought to pinpoint how age and gender are related to auditory processing. Bellis and colleague Laura Ann Wilbur recruited groups of 120 healthy men and women across set age groups: 20 to 25, 35 to 40, 55 to 60, and 70 to 75.

Each group was given three tests of their sound processing, such as whether they could listen to two different things at once and accurately repeat them.

The researchers found that although both sexes showed waning sound processing at ages 40 to 55, men had gradual declines starting in their late 30s, while women worsened abruptly around age 55, after menopause.

But neither sex continued on the auditory downward spiral into their 60s and 70s, indicating the decline in sound processing stabilizes at some point, according to the report in the April issue of the Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research.

Bellis pointed out that women's longer-lasting ability to process sounds may explain why during their childbearing years, women seem to be better than men at juggling several things at once.

Men's early decline in this area may also explain why women typically complain their husbands don't ``hear'' them, although their standard hearing tests come out fine, Bellis said.

But women do seem to have at least one hearing disadvantage. The study showed women tended to lose their ability to perceive cues from vocal tones for a period of time after menopause. This, according to Bellis, may help explain men's complaints that their wives take everything they say the ''wrong'' way.

``These are the most common complaints that audiologists hear--'He doesn't listen. She takes everything the wrong way,''' Bellis noted. ``This really provides illumination into things we've taken for granted as stereotypical gender differences. There may be a biological basis to the things we've always associated with hormones and emotions.''

Bellis said she hopes future research will investigate ways to slow the decline of auditory processing.

``I'm looking at preservation of function and reversal of decline,'' she said. ``Our preliminary data is positive--we might be able to slow down some of this degeneration.''

SOURCE: Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research 2001;44:246-263.

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