Can Aspies hear better.

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Just been thinking about it. I Offen hear a lot of sounds that others don't.

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I'm pushing myself to be better. But what does that mean?

i've never know anyone like me ,so friendly PM's are always welcome .

Same hear er, here. Where I used live, on a quiet day I could hear the smack of billiard balls from a neighbor's house, a few houses over. Stuff like that.

I don't hear sounds others don't. It's just that some sounds either annoy me more, shatter my nerves more than others, or hurt my ears more. But according to various hearing tests, I am slightly deafer than average.

Some people with autism do have overly acute senses, particularly hearing, but that isn't true in all cases. They can have serious sensory deficits as well. I am no more sound sensitive than the average person. The only time I have trouble is when I hear funny noises and I don't know where they are coming from.

I think it's more to do with the processing of sensory information - NTs tune the sounds out so they don't hear them. There are of course, exceptional hearing people - both NT and ND - but I don't think autistics are predisposed to better hearing (for example, using a pure tone test) although their listening experience may differ.

But, as is the case for the other senses, it the under/over processing can go the other way.

My hearing is in the normal range.

My hearing is not especially acute.

Sometimes, my hearing is "selective," in that I ignore sounds/instructions which I just do not want to hear.

I have slight hearing loss in both ears, probably. Because of earwax.

Heightened perception is a classic trademark of autism. It all derived from the solitary forager hypothesis background of our ancestors. We were the pioneers who eschewed the social circles to discover new foods, lands, etc. Black and white thinking, as well as heightened perception, creativity and curiosity were critical mechanisms for survival.

I hear normally out of my left ear and not so well out of my right ear.

I have tinnitus in both ears but otherwise seem to have a selective hearing. If alone I'm good at filtering out other sounds and listening to conversations quite some distance away (too nosy for my own good!) but I'm not sure if that correlates with being able to hear better in general. Come to think of it, regarding tinnitus which can be a menace sometimes, I suppose it is actually very useful to have a selective hearing.

A lot of people have commented to me that I have really good hearing.

when I was young, despite hearing damage from exposure to .30-06 rifle blasts at close range at age 5 [gave me ringing that lasts to this day], I had extraordinarily sensitive hearing, not able to tolerate loud sounds [perhaps a souvenir from exposure to that rifle blast at a tender age] and ability to hear sounds as faint as that of insects walking on the walls of my bathroom at night- they made a very subtle "tapapapapapa---tap tap---tapapapapapapa...." sound with all their little legs and feets marching away. I can still hear the sound of blood rushing through my head capillaries if it is quiet enough around me. squeaks and rattles in old cars drive me BATTY! the sound of my heart beating at night keeps me awake unless I mask it with brown noise from an old HEPA filter against the wall [makes it resonate louder]. I don't know if that is technically aural acuity or something else in my brain that turns the volume up all the time. yet I have trouble understanding people on the phone, always have. is that "auditory processing disorder"?

Of course the beauty of autism is being able to hear a pin drop a mile away, but unable to understand what someone is saying to you. It sounds like they're saying, "wha blomp kiznuble fishstick popsicle glormp day", but that can't be right.

I have a fear of having to repeatedly ask somebody to clarify what they said to me, I had to do that on the phone with an india indian help desk employee and he got discernibly irritated with me.

My hearing is so acute that I can often hear across the house or from behind two closed doors and a wall. I joke that I have 'Elf Ears' or 'Vulcan hearing'.