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by tswartz
3479 days ago
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A long, but interesting article about a deaf tennis player excelling in a sport that puts a value on hearing. I can certainly understand how hearing is an important part, as described by Andy Roddick in the article, "that his first reaction to an opponent’s shots comes from his hearing, as does his initial information about the shot coming toward him." But I agree with the author that this may be a case of the majority of players and coaches being able to hear and thus the sport puts more value on that then being able to predict (based on visual cues) where your opponent is going to hit the ball. Kudos to Lee Duck-hee changing the sport. >>People who were born deaf or hard of hearing may have a stronger sense of intuition in general, and tend to see subtle clues in a person’s face or body language better than people with normal hearing,” Stringer said. “They are more visual, because when one sense is compromised, other senses are heightened to compensate. If my hypothesis is correct, people who are deaf or hard of hearing may have an advantage in tennis because they can pick up visual cues faster and better as to their opponent’s plans, and may have better reflexes because they see things sooner. |
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There is one simple situations, where most of my hearing friends understand it: Traffic. Most people rely on their hearing heavily to navigate through cities. I don't. For me there is basically changing nothing with the upcoming electric cars. But I often grasp hard into my friends clothes, when there is an electric car coming and we're crossing roads. Meanwhile, I just say: "Oh, a Tesla." (which is not that common on European roads) and people stop. Way easier, than grabbing as much people as possible. Which is usually only two of the group.
Same for sports. In road racing, I'm very well at anticipating attacks and movements in the peloton. Often not only split seconds earlier than others, but whole seconds.
Besides these small upsides, I would give a lot to be hearing. There are more (socially) tough downsides to it [1].
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unilateral_hearing_loss#Profou...