Researchers discover the cause behind 'inattentional deafness'
Although reseatchers have known about the phenomenon of 'inattentional deafness,' the exact reasons behind it were not known. A team of researchers from University College London conducted a study on how concentrating on a visual task renders people temporarily deaf to the surrounding sounds. They selected a group of subjects who were exposed to a demanding visual task. Simultaneously, the subjects were also exposed to sounds that were clearly audible. However, the subjects were not able to hear them. Their?brain activity, which was observed?in real-time using MEG (magnetoencephalography), indicated that "people were not only ignoring or filtering out the sounds, they were not actually hearing them in the first place," according to?study co-author Dr Maria Chait (UCL Ear Institute). This indicates that the sensory perception of the brain reduces under the load of visual stimuli. ??
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