An odd relationship between hearing sounds vs. voices

I am so relieved that it's not just me that has this issue, especially when watching TV. Like others have said, I find myself turning down the volume because the background music seems too loud, and then turning the volume up again because the dialogue sounds too quiet. 

Yes, I'm exactly the same. I used to be able to hear my ex breathing when he was at the other end of the house when we lived together, but translating the sound of someone talking to me into words is very difficult. I always have to turn the TV up very loud (and then back down again if there's music or sound effects) or use subtitles.

Yes I experience this a lot.

I too watch TV with the subtitles always on. However they are not always in sync with the dialogue, which makes it hard to process. I'm also constantly turning the volume up and down due to the variable sound effects. Sometimes I try rewinding to hear the dialogue again. However if the background noise is too loud the subtitles are the only way I can understand what is being said.

I cannot stand it if anyone speaks over the TV. I need warning and to be able to pause one sound first before I can focus on the other. If both happen at the same time I cannot hear or understand either of them. It all gets scrambled together and my brain doesn't process anything meaningful.

It's the same if I'm trying to converse and there is another background noise or interruption. It puts me off totally and I can't process what the other person is saying or what I am supposed to be saying. Any kind of social or group situation and I find it extremely difficult to listen or talk.

If I am in a noisy environment I find it almost impossible to hold a conversation, as I can't hear what is being said. It becomes an overwhelming wall of noise. 

I put it down to my brain being unable to filter sounds. Every sound is competing for attention. The only sounds I can pick out are the higher pitched ones, that I generally find I am the most sensitive to and intolerant of. I can hear a reversing bleeper or a dog yapping half a mile away 

I can hear lots of background noises like humming and find low frequency especially hard, but I don't always hear conversations.

I used to struggle with discos when I was younger, so usually avoided conversation as I couldn't hear what others say. I find it difficult to hear if there are background noises.

Regarding not hearing when people speak, I will be concentrating on one thing, so if someone wants to say something they need to warn me otherwise I only hear the end.

I was watching a BBC series recently, about the origins of the SAS, they alternated frankly mumbled, low volume speech with blasting rock tracks and explosions. A bloody nightmare! Volume controls up and down like a fiddler's elbow.

>with my incredibly sensitive hearing, I struggle to hear and interpret words and voices

That may be why.  It's not so much that your hearing is sensitive, it's that your brain isn't tuning out the background noises and tuning in the speech.

A simple way to demonstrate this sort of tuning is to think about say the colour blue.  Then go scan a cluttered room looking for all the blue objects.  You will perceive the room differently, small blue items that you wouldn't normally notice become quite prominent.  This is how a lot of supermarket branding works.  You go looking for a tin of beans and the Heinz can will probably jump right out at you.

Non Autistic people have brains well tuned to picking out speech.  To the point where someone whispering in a library, cinema or bedroom is something they can't tune it out very well at all and find it highly distracting or irritating.

Usually it has to do with frequencies, bad acoustics, and poor mix downs - not to mention the compression of files for broadcast. And when media is transferred to different formats (Broadcast to streaming), definition can get lost. 

To see if it's an issue with your own 'calibration', sit in a quiet park and begin to pay attention to everything around you. This is easier in the summer when listening to birds. If your library has a vinyl collexion and a station for listening, find an old album to sit and listen to - something recorded at least 40 years ago. 

I cannot handle the high pitch ringing these editors keep using, it's a great way to make the public go deaf at those frequencies. 

It may be auditory processing disorder (APD) The hearing test using beeps is usually normal but speech recognition is poor, like you said it is to do with how the brain interprets sound rather than a deficit in “collecting” it so to speak. In my case I have perfect low frequency and very high frequency hearing but everything in between is mild to moderately impaired on a hearing test due to ear infections and some damage at a ridiculously loud concert. 

I do not understand why they make TV with such relatively loud "background" music and quiet mumbling voices. Everyone I know hates it too. Why do they do it? Who does it not bother? I may be my age that most people I know are older and their hearing also not as good as it was, or maybe everyone I know is actually ND... I so wish they would invent the tech to be able to turn down only the background music! Surely we have reached the technolgical stage where it is possible to have a TV with 2 volume controls, one for dialogue and one for background music?! And wouldn't it be wonderful!