Although medical professionals will call these bones the malleus, incus, and stapes, you might know them as the hammer, anvil, and stirrup. This portion of the ear is where we will find the ossicles, or 3 small bones suspended behind the ear drum. The eardrum marks the start of the middle ear space. The eardrum is a very thin membrane that vibrates like a drumhead due to sound hitting it. Once the sound is trapped in the ear canal, everything is directed towards our tympanic membrane, or eardrum. Sounds are airwaves and these are funneled into the ear canal by the pinna. The portion that captures and therefore funnels sound into the pinna. The outer ear is the portion that is visible to us and is typically what people will think of when they think of ears. As a result, our brains do all the hard work of understanding. They work together to funnel and capture sound and thus, feed it into our brains. In a normal auditory system, the ear is comprised of 3 distinct sections: the outer ear, the middle ear, and the inner ear. So, how do we hear? How does the ear really work?

For information on the importance of hearing, check out our previous blog. Most people don’t realize how important this sense really is on our day-to-day life.

How does the ear work? Hearing is an essential sense that we rely on every day for communication and safety.

Hammer anvil and stirrup