Do aspies have better hearing?

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I can hear things that other people haven't heard. For example, I heard the ringtone of a cell phone from far away in a restaurant recently. No one else at the table heard it.

me too

I've often wondered about this -- my son can hear music playing in a very loud restaurant that I can't hear at all. It's kind of cool.

I can hear dog whistles and other very high sounds.
And I can hear some very deep sounds like some ventilator in my landladies kitchen which she can't hear. So I have to send her a SMS if she forgets to turn it of.

But: I can't make out human voices against background noise like music or traffic. One of the reasons why I never go to parties, everybody else can talk and I don't hear anything but the music as long as they're not screaming at me.

I also have a hard time hearing people talk over background noises as many other aspies do. Such as riding in a car with the windows down or the music up.

PilotPirx wrote "But: I can't make out human voices against background noise like music or traffic. One of the reasons why I never go to parties, everybody else can talk and I don't hear anything but the music"

Same here. I feel lonely at parties 'cos of it.

Also I hear the tiniest(?) of noises, like the buzzin' sounds of transformators in lamps or lights. I try to accept but sometimes it annoys me to the bone.

Last edited by Erminea on 17 Sep 2008, 1:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I can hear bats.

And from quite some distance - up to 400 yds with no line-of-sight obstructions.

Others are completely oblivious.

When we did experimental testing of our frequency ranges in high-school biology class, I continued way past everyone else.

And you couldn't fake it - as you had to stand with your back to the tester and tell him when he'd emitted.

Not that useful - other than when bat-spotting, of course.

i never understood why the music had to be so loud. i have problems to outloud the music and i have problems to hear others, too. why couldn't it just be lower so we can talk together? who wants it so loud?

i always seems to still hear the tv/pc wen hes on 0 i first tough that it whas my imagination
edit:really quiet sound acctualy thats why i tought it whas my imagination first

One reason I rarely go to events with music.
It's always UNBELIEVABLY loud - painfully so.
How is that meant to be enjoyable.
The most pleasurable volume is background.
Nobody goes to events other than gigs, for the bluddy music.
The master volume should always be in the hands of the host, NEVER the DJ/band/whatever.
Most bands don't even need amplification at bars with live music, etc.

It's hypersensitivity. We can hear, feel, smell, see things more easily. It's beneficial some of the time.

I could hear the old computer monitors if they were accidentally left on.

One summer, several air conditioners in my apartment complex died around the same time. Before they died, they emitted this really annoying humming/throbbing sound that could not be escaped without leaving the complex. I was going crazy and losing sleep. No one could hear it but me. The management and maintenance staff thought I was nuts. They kept trying to tell me it was cicadas (as if I didn't know what cicadas sound like after living here over 30 years), and they kept trying to fix my A/C even though I told them I could still hear it with my A/C turned off. I got the last laugh though. I watched the maintenance guy who was ignoring me have to get up on the roof and replace the units in the 110+ degree heat. Fortunately, that many units have never gone out at one time since then.

I have trouble hearing conversations over background noise too. Before I found out about AS, I used to think I had suffered hearing damage from being onstage with symphony orchestras. (I used to sing in choirs, and it seemed like they always put me behind the brass or percussion.)

I hate loud music too, particularly when the bass is boosted too much.

I don't like the bars and parties because the music is too loud to be enjoyed, and I can pick out sounds that others can't. Go figure. Lots of people can't hear things because they have damaged their hearing by unprotected exposure to high sound levels, and they're the abnormal ones because they are damaged.

I know what you mean, I can be half way across the house, and I hear the cells go of before anyone even if they are right next to phone.

Not necessarily. In my case, even though I'm more sensitive to some sorts of noise (i.e., banging and high-pitched sounds), I still have to sit at the front of all my classes in order to properly hear the professor most times. That being said, my hearing difficulties are most definitely medical, so this could easily not be the case for a great majority of people.

same