Parenting Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for parents, grandparents, nannies and others with a parenting role. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
Are there any health risks in earbuds?
Assuming moderate use (say, no more than 1-2 hours a day) of music that is not overly loud - e.g. no heavy metal but some classic rock on their MP3 players - is there any health related reason to force children to listen to music from a speaker vs earbuds?
Just to clarify - these are their separate personal earbuds at home; so there's no hygienic concern at all.
Merely physical effect on the ear from the earbud being there; or effect on hearing.
The rule of thumb for traditional headphones is that if you as a parent can hear the music your child is listening to, it's too loud and your child should turn the volume down before they start damaging their hearing.
Earbuds leak less sound, though, so you have a harder time policing the volume level. By the time it gets loud enough for you to hear, your child may already be damaging their hearing.
