(Hear.com) — It’s a well-known fact that the body is interconnected, but a new study is magnifying just how closely eyes and ears work together. Publishing their findings last week, Duke University scientists discovered that they can pinpoint where someone is looking simply by listening to their ears.
“You can actually estimate the movement of the eyes, the position of the target that the eyes are going to look at, just from recordings made with a microphone in the ear canal,” professor and study senior author Jennifer Groh said in a press release. Similarly, the team found that by knowing where someone was looking, they could predict the waveform of the subtle ear sound.
So where exactly do these “ear squeaks” come from? According to Groh, they may occur when “eye movements stimulate the brain to contract either middle ear muscles, which typically help dampen loud sounds, or the hair cells that help amplify quiet sounds,” the release explains.
While their purpose is still uncertain, Groh has a hunch: “We think this is part of a system for allowing the brain to match up where sights and sounds are located, even though our eyes can move when our head and ears do not.” Now, the researchers plan to use this discovery to examine whether these ear squeaks could enhance perception and how they could be used to develop improved hearing tests.
Listen to the sounds the ears make as the eyes move here.