The eyes and ears have long been known to work together to help us experience and interpret the world around us, and a new study reveals another facet of their intertwined functioning.

The eyes and ears have long been known to work together to help us experience and interpret the world around us, and a new study reveals another facet of their intertwined functioning. A team of researchers in the U.S. found that movement in the eye triggers activity in the eardrums even if no sound is present.  "Surprisingly, these eardrum vibrations start slightly before the eyes move, indicating that motion in the ears and the eyes are controlled by the same motor commands deep within the brain," according to a release by Duke University. The eardrums' activities were found to occur in sync with one another and in correlation with how large a movement the eyes were making. "The eardrum movements literally contain information about what the eyes are doing," Jennifer Groh, one of the researchers, noted. "This demonstrates that these two sensory pathways are coupled, and they are coupled at the earliest points." 
The team notes that the study's findings could lead to new understanding of hearing disorders.