Unless your job (think: construction or woodworking) requires it, you may not think to wear hearing protection in noisy spaces. But in reality, you should be wearing earplugs when you’re attending a music festival, riding a motorcycle, or even mowing your lawn, says Taylor.
Without them, “you could experience temporary tinnitus or temporary hearing loss,” she adds. “Sometimes after noise exposure, we see a temporary threshold shift, where if someone tested your hearing right after that concert, you would present with hearing loss. It can recover, but you would definitely leave the concert with ringing in your ears.”
In fact, sporting events are so loud, you might suffer hearing loss after just 15 minutes of exposure, and it can take as little as five minutes to harm your hearing while at a nightclub or concert. Generally speaking, the louder the sound and longer the exposure, the less time it takes and the greater the risk for hearing loss to occur, according to the CDC3.
People often push back on wearing ear protection at concerts, says Taylor, as they believe they won’t be able to hear the artist with plugs in. But there are earplugs on the market, such as those from Loop and Eargasm, that are specifically designed for music—and look pretty cute to boot, she notes. “You hear the music perfectly, it’s just a little softer,” she adds. “In my opinion, the music sounds a little better because it’s not, like, painfully loud.”
In other instances, you’re fine to use the cheap foam earplugs available at the hardware store. Just make sure to put them in them properly for adequate protection, says Taylor.