Prof. Dr. med. Alfred Tomatis (1920-2001) was a French ENT - physician who researched the interaction between hearing, psyche, body and voice. On the basis of studies on the development of hearing, he developed a special pedagogy of hearing.
Systemic hearing therapy
At the beginning of a systemic hearing therapy, a hearing threshold and sound perception test is always carried out. The measured data from both tests are incorporated into a hearing profile. It shows the hearing and sound perception ability in everyday life. In children/young people, rapid distractibility or lack of motivation can improve. It can often be observed that concentration decreases significantly with increasing duration. The hearing and sound perception test has been proven to provide information about the potential of the individual's auditory attention. In systemic hearing therapy, sound media with a special frequency range are played through special headphones, which were poorly or not perceived at all in the hearing threshold and sound perception test. After the measurement of the hearing threshold and sound perception test, everyone receives his or her individual hearing program. The music of W.A. Mozart is particularly suitable for systemic hearing therapy, with new pieces of music (minuets, oboe concertos) now also supplementing the therapy procedure. The frequency range used in the hearing therapy can be technically modified to strengthen the ability to listen. The music is played alternately lateralized, which causes a training of the middle ear muscles. The transmission of auditory information causes a charged cerebral cortex, which leads to improved auditory attention, so that the overall attention span improves.
What happens when you listen The main task of the ear is to detect and analyse sounds. The ear picks up sound waves via the auricle, from where they enter the auditory canal and then innervate the eardrum. The ossicles are located behind the eardrum in the middle ear: the malleus, anvil and stapes, which are set in motion by sound waves. First, the hammer picks up the vibration and transmits it to the anvil. The anvil then transmits the vibration to the stapes in the inner ear, where the cochlea is also located. This is a spirally wound bone cavity that contains fluid. The fluid is compressed by the stapes. This process creates a travelling wave, the movement of which subsequently triggers nerve impulses. In the brain, the actual subjective sound sensation is produced in the primary auditory cortex, which brings together the individual harmonic and noisy sound components. The young ear can distinguish between 10 octaves and reacts to sound waves in the frequency range between 16 and 20,000 HZ.