Can Deaf People Hear?
It is surprising to many people outside of the Deaf Community, but Deaf people can often hear. The Deaf are considered “deaf” once they have passed a certain decibel (dB) hearing loss. Many people who are profoundly deaf can still hear planes, dogs barking, etc. Hearing a sound does not mean that Deaf people can understand speech. A person with a significant hearing loss generally has difficulty or inability to hear speech even when aided.
Your teacher is right… it depends on their degree of hearing loss. Basically… anything over a 20 dB loss is considered “hard-of-hearing.” Most speech is between 30-50 dB, so any loss greater than that will affect someone’s ability to understand speech. A dB loss of 70 or greater is considered “profound,” and is generally the cutoff for being “deaf” and not “HoH.” Keep in mind that it’s not that simple… you could have a hearing loss of 10 dB for low frequencies, and 80 dB for high frequencies, meaning you’d be able to hear low sounds but not high sounds. You’d have to talk to an audiologist for more details about that, and to see your audiogram. Hearing aids also only improve hearing so much, and not for all frequencies. The dB loss can also vary per ear. (My friend, for example, has a loss of 80 in one ear, and 95 in the other.) So… basically, it depends on each person. Some may be able to hear loud noises, others may be able to hear some low frequencies, or high frequencies, a
