What Makes Human Hearing Special?

Abstract

Humans and many other animals can hear a wide range of sounds. We can hear low and high notes and both quiet and loud sounds. We are also very good at telling the difference between sounds that are similar, like the speech sounds “argh” and “ah,” and picking apart sounds that are mixed together, like when an orchestra is playing. But how do human hearing abilities compare to those of other animals? In this article, we discover how the inner ear determines hearing abilities. Many other mammals can hear very high notes that we cannot, and some can hear quiet sounds that we cannot. However, humans may be better than any other species at distinguishing similar sounds. We know this because, milliseconds after the sounds around us go into our ears, other sounds come out: sounds that are actually produced by those same ears!