
Brains of blind people adapt to sharpen sense of hearing: study - dnetesn
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2019-04-brains-people-sharpen.html
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everdev
A professor had us replicate this effect in college.

We broke up into pairs and one person put on a blindfold while the other
person let them around campus.

After about 5 minutes the person being blindfolded could hear people,
conversations, cars, etc. far sooner than their partner.

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katakuchi
We've had these blind simulations done as well, where we have the sudden
realization we're subjected to our other senses - this reliance creates an
extra effort to enhance these senses as we're using them more intensely then
otherwise. Also the lack of information coming from sight means you'd have
brainpower to allocate elsewhere.

Short-term it felt more like noticing other smaller nuances in hearing,
feeling and smelling. I guess like learning to distinguish words in a new
foreign language after weeks/months of being in that foreign country.

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Tempest1981
I thought this was well known. For example, from 2003:

[https://consumer.healthday.com/disabilities-
information-11/b...](https://consumer.healthday.com/disabilities-
information-11/blindness-health-news-67/brains-of-the-blind-adapt-513688.html)

I guess this is the difference: "Instead of simply looking to see which parts
of the brain were most active while listening, both studies examined the
sensitivity of the brain to subtle differences in auditory frequency."

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hprotagonist
The perceptual phenomenon is well known. What’s less well known is the
mechanism.

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HNLurker2
How much is invitable need to adapt? Or how much is inferiority complex and
having to make up for it by deliberately practicing your skills?

