Association between leisure noise exposure and hearing status in young Croatian adults
Selma Cvijetić
Institute for Medical Research and Occupational Health, Division of Occupational and Environmental HealthZagreb, Croatia
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Categoría del artículo: Original article
Publicado en línea: 30 sept 2025
Páginas: 211 - 217
Recibido: 01 feb 2025
Aceptado: 01 jul 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/aiht-2025-76-3968
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© 2025 Selma Cvijetić et al., published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Demographic and health characteristics of the participants
| Age (yrs.) | 22.0±2.5 | 23.1±1.7 | |
| Educational status: | |||
| - university students | 14 (32.6) | 62 (95.4) | |
| - high-school students | 6 (13.9) | 2 (3.1) | |
| - fire academy | 23 (53.5) | 1 (1.5) | |
| Previous otitis | 7 (16.3) | 12 (18.5) | 0.735 |
| Chronic diseases | 8 (18.6) | 17 (26.1) | 0.335 |
| Medicine taking | 5 (11.6) | 10 (15.4) | 0.541 |
| Otoscopy (cerumen, infections, abnormalities) | 10 (23.2) | 18 (27.6) | 0.565 |
Hearing status of the participants
| Subjective symptom – single (tinnitus, pain or sensitivity to noise) | 20 (46.5) | 38 (58.4) | 0.182 |
| Subjective symptoms (multiple) | 3 (6.9) | 13 (20.0) | 0.560 |
| Self-assessment of hearing: | |||
| - good | 43 (97.7) | 56 (86.1) | 0.219 |
| - average | 0 | 9 (13.9) | 0.225 |
| - bad | 0 | 0 | / |
| Hearing threshold, right ear (dB) |
11.2±2.5 | 12.6±3.7 | 0.089 |
| Hearing threshold, left ear (dB) |
11.2±1.7 | 12.1±3.7 | 0.809 |
| Hearing loss (mild sensorineural) | 1(2.2) | 6 (9.2) | 0.142 |
Time spent at noisy places and self-assessment of hearing loss
| Visiting noisy places (h/month) | |||
| - Night club | 10.0±5.9 | 8.4±5.3 | 0.356 |
| - Concert | 9.2±5.0 | 7.6±2.7 | 0.320 |
| - Cinema | 4.1±3.3 | 5.2±2.4 | 0.243 |
| Total time of visiting noisy places (h/month) | 12.8±8.0 | 11.3±7.4 | 0.320 |
| Self-assessment of hearing loss risk | |||
| - High risk | 2 (4.6) | 1 (1.5) | 0.344 |
| - Medium risk | 16 (37.2) | 12 (18.4) | |
| - Low risk | 16 (37.2) | 40 (61.4) | |
| - No risk | 9 (20.9) | 10 (15.3) | 0.490 |
Headphones/speakers usage in participants
| Listening music on weekdays (h/day) | 2.3±2.3 | 2.2±1.6 | 0.711 |
| Listening music on weekends (h/day) | 3.3±2.0 | 2.7±1.9 | 0.133 |
| Gaming on weekdays (h/day) | 0.7±1.2 | 0.1±0.4 | |
| Gaming on weekends (h/day) | 1.5±2.0 | 0.2±0.5 | |
| Total time of using headphones/speakers (h/day) | 1.9±1.2 | 1.3±0.8 | |
| Headphones | 11 (25.6) | 36 (55.3) | |
| Speakers | 9 (20.9) | 5 (7.7) | |
| Both | 23 (53.5) | 24 (36.9) | 0.113 |
| Type of headphones | |||
| - in-ear | 25 (58.1) | 59 (90.8) | |
| - over-ear | 6 (13.9 | 3 (4.6) | 0.093 |
| - both | 12 (27.9) | 3 (4.6) | |
| Self-reported listening at high volume ( |
17 (39.5) | 17 (26.1) | 0.250 |
| Measured headphone volume (dB) | 70.3±10.0 | 65.5±9.6 | |