Why don't babies cause themselves hearing damage?

Question

I'm a science teacher, I was teaching my class about hearing damage and we found out together how loud babies cry.
They asked me "why don't babies make themselves go deaf?" and I had lots of answers for them but no idea if they were right. Anyone know?

Answer 1

Babies don't cry loud enough to cause hearing damage. Their cry is just loud enough, at at the right pitch, and for the right duration, to be really, really annoying, particularly if the baby is not yours and you are stuck behind it in a shopping check-out.
But not loud enough to cause damage, just shatter your nerves

Remember, this cry is an evolutionary development to make sure the baby is not ignored. It is meant to be annoying.

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Answer 2

It takes extended periods of extreme noise to cause deafness. Something like 120 db or greater. A baby screaming is probably no more than 80 db, and it'snot a linear scale - 90 is a LOT more than 80, and 100 is a LOT more than 90 and so on.

Answer 3

It is also of interest that babies have a much wider range of hearing than adults do. They are much more sensitive to higher frequencies than adults are.

Perhaps all the screaming DOES do damage to babies hearing, at least in the long term.

Answer 4

I don't know, but that's a darn good question. My kids screamed so much when they were babies I was certain I'd be deaf by my next birthday.

Answer 5

they give u hearing damage now so when they r teens u cant hear them sneaking out its the unspoken baby rule