Semester Project

Sight Versus Hearing: Which Would You Choose?

Have you ever wondered what it would be like not to have either your sense of sight or your sense of hearing? How would your world be different from what it is now, if it would be different at all? These are some of the very questions we tried to answer earlier in the year in our Communications 141 course. Professor Lee asked the class the following question: If given the choice of living the rest of your life with either vision or audition but not both, which would you choose? After briefly reviewing the results in class, we found what seemed to be a striking coincidence between the choices that those who are right handed and those who are left-handed had made. I intend to further explore this idea to see whether or not hand dominance has any correlation to the preference of choosing sight over audition and vice versa. My hypothesis is that the results will show that there is a relationship between hand dominance and gender upon which sense to choose to keep between sight and audition.

One very important area that has been extensively researched and may also factor into the perception of speech or audition being of more importance to the other, is that of hemispheric lateralization of the brain (Haseltine 1). This term refers to the division of the brain into left and right halves (Haseltine 1). Research shows that one side of the brain controls human beings over the other (Haseltine 1). This research explains why one side of the body possesses dominant characteristics whether it is in the hands, feet, ears, or eyes (Haseltine 1).

Each side of the brain controls different sides of the body, namely, the right brain controls the left side of the body dominance and the left-brain controls right side of the body dominance. Most people tend to be controlled by their left-brain because the majority of people are dominant with their right hands or feet. Those controlled by their right brain are less abundant than those controlled by their left-brain. This is evident by the fewer number of left-handed people in the world (Haseltine 1). Not only do the different sides of the brain dominate different sides of the body, but they also control different aspects of human life. For instance, the left-brain has been proven as better suited to control fine movements and speech in the majority of people (Haseltine 1). The left-brain has also been shown to be superior to the right brain when it comes to analyzing fine details in vision, audition, and touch (Haseltine 1). The right brain, in contrast, has been proven to “read facial expressions, decode tone of voice in speech, and comprehend the big picture in visual, auditory, and tactile stimuli better than the left side of the brain does” (Haseltine 1).

In order to find out if the importance of how speech and hearing were perceived differently in people who are controlled by different parts of the brain, I conducted a survey consisting of students at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The survey consisted of students between the ages of twenty and twenty-three. With the use of this survey, I had hoped to further research the topic originally brought up in class and to see if the results we found were the effects of something such as brain dominance or merely a coincidence. In the survey, I asked the age and gender of the person and whether they were right handed or left-handed. I also asked the following question: If you had to lose either your sense of sight or your sense or hearing, but were able to choose the sense you were able keep, which one would choose? The survey concluded by asking why the participant chose to keep the sense they did.

After reviewing the results, I found them to be extremely interesting. The survey consisted of fifty students, with twenty-five male and twenty-five female participants. I found that there were very mixed feelings on the reasons for choosing sight over audition and, in turn the same for choosing audition over sight. I found that the reasons for choosing one sense over the other were very widespread ranging from learning styles to technological advancements that better aid the loss of one sense over the other to different perceptions of importance for each of the two senses.

There are many reasons that support the choice to keep the sense of sight over audition. Extremely important is that of different learning styles which seem to factor in to how people perceive and understand different ideas. For those people who are visual learners, the loss of the sense of sight would be devastating due to the fact that seeing is their primary style if learning. For those who enjoy seeing things that are aesthetically pleasing, the loss of vision would inhibit the appreciation of beauty that can only be seen. Some students felt that the sense of sight is used more and is more helpful in the active world of communication as opposed to audition. One individual in particular felt that there are more accommodations to supplement loss of hearing as opposed to loss of sight such as sign language for communicating. The most important and recurring theme I found in the surveys supporting the choice of sight over audition seemed to be that having the sense of sight is more practical. Many people felt that by keeping the sense of sight one could be better attuned to their surroundings and would ultimately constitute in feeling more in touch with the world around them even though they had lost one of their five primary senses. In essence, these students felt that they could still achieve a sense of independence with the sense of sight that could not be maintained if they had lost that sense.

I also found many different reasons that supported the choice to keep the sense of audition over the sense of sight. The idea that seemed to be the most widespread in the surveys took a main focus on the effect that music had on their lives. Those that were involved with music whether it be through playing music or listening to music seemed to feel that their world would be completely lost without having the ability to continue to involve music in their everyday lifestyles. Furthermore, just as those who chose to keep the sense of sight over audition felt that there were more accommodations to supplement the loss of hearing, many which chose audition felt that there were also more accommodations to supplement the loss of sight. Some of these accommodations include new computer technologies, which enable the user to speak directly to the computer just as if it were a mouse or keyboard instead of a voice. One very important factor seemed to be the idea that by choosing to keep the sense of sight one never has to learn a new language such as sign language to communicate. By being able to hear, one will always be able to speak. If one were to lose the sense of hearing, verbal speech would not be as easy and may even be lost because of the interdependence of speech and hearing on each other. Furthermore, a couple of students felt that sight alone does not give enough information, but audition gives one a sense of space and timing that is not present without being able to hear.

Statistically, there were also some very interesting figures found as a result of the survey. In all, 36 right-handed students and 14 left-handed students participated in the study. Chart one compares the overall number of students, both right-handed and left-handed, who chose to keep their sense of sight over audition. In all, 34 students chose to keep their sense of sight. Twenty-seven of the 34 were right-handed, while only nine were left-handed. Consequently over 80 percent of the right-handed students chose sight while over half of the left-handed students chose sight. This would suggest a pattern in the thinking of right-handed students. This shows that the left side of the brain may very well be the cause of right-handed students choosing sight over audition.

Chart two compares the left-handed participants who chose to keep their sight with left-handed students who chose to keep their audition. Of the left-handed students, the numbers of participants were exactly equal, having seven students choosing sight over audition, and seven also choosing audition over sight. This may also suggest a pattern in the way students who are left-handed think about sight versus audition. Because the percentage of students who are left-handed and chose audition is higher than that of right-handed participants, this may be evidence that suggests that students who are controlled by the right side of the brain may be more sensitive to auditory noises.

Chart three examines the comparison between right-handed students who chose to keep sight over audition and vice versa. There were 17 right-handed students who chose to keep sight while only 9 chose to keep audition. By observing the results in this way, the study further shows the possibility for right-handed (left-brained) students to prefer sight to those students who are left-handed (right-brained).

Chart four looks at the overall number for students who chose audition over sight. It compares the number of right-handed students with the number of left-handed students. There were 16 students in all who chose audition over sight. Nine, or 56 percent of these participants are right-handed while seven, or 44 percent are left-handed. This constitutes for 23 percent of the total right-handed participants and 50 percent of the left-handed participants. This final analysis of the results seems to hint that there is a correlation between which side of the brain is dominant and which sense one prefers.

One finding that seemed to be inconsistent with what I had originally hypothesized is the lack of differences between men and women. The final chart, chart five, is not only a compilation of all the statistical result, but is also evidence of the difference of gender in the study, or lack there of. For the most part, it shows an insignificant change in how men and women viewed the subject. For instance, right-handed men and women who chose sight over audition only differed by one student. Fourteen men and thirteen women chose this option. Likewise, right-handed men and women who chose audition over sight only contrast by one student as well. The same pattern is seen for left-handed men and women who chose sight over audition there seems to be only a difference of one participant. The largest gap between men and women occur with the choice of left-handed men and women who chose audition over sight. This final result, however, only differs by three students. This number is not significant enough to conclude that gender had a large affect on the study.

In conclusion, it is intriguing to see the statistical results brought out by the survey. I have found that my hypothesis on the subject is only half correct. The results showed a difference in how men and women who are right-handed and men and women who are left-handed viewed the following question: If given the choice of living the rest of your life with either vision or audition but not both, which would you choose? What I did not find in the study that I had originally expected is that of a pattern between the men and women and the choices they made. For the most part, men and women were consistent with the number of participants who chose sight over audition and vice versa. One idea for possibly making this study more effective in the future is to gather the same number of participants who are right-handed and left-handed. The study that was conducted, however, seems to effectively answer our question from the beginning of the year. There is a difference in how right-handed people and left-handed people view the importance of the sense of sight and that of audition.

Works Cited

Haseltine, Eric. "Your Better Half." Discover (June 1999): 19 April 2001. Online. Infotrac. <http://web5.infotrac.galegroup.com/itw/i…dyn=46!xrn_7_0_A55926792?sw_aep=unc_main