Characteristics of the included studies are summarized in Additional file
1 (Table S1). Of the 14 included studies, six were longitudinal studies [
19‐
21,
27‐
29] and eight were cross-sectional studies [
22‐
26,
30‐
32]. Twelve studies [
19‐
22,
24‐
29,
31,
32] were population-based and two studies [
23,
30] were hospital-based. Occupation information was not adequately described in nearly all studies. The mean age of the participants was 44.8 years. By the sex of the participants, five [
19,
22,
24,
29,
31] studies enrolled men only, two [
20,
27] enrolled women only, and the remaining seven [
21,
23,
25,
26,
28,
30,
32] included both men and women. Seven studies [
19‐
22,
25,
27,
29] were conducted in Western countries (Australia, Finland, Sweden, and the USA), six [
23,
24,
26,
28,
31,
32] in Asian countries (Bangladesh, China, Iran, Japan, and South Korea), and one [
30] in African country (Nigeria). BMI or WC was self-reported in four studies [
20,
22,
29,
31], while the remaining ten studies [
19,
21,
23‐
28,
30,
32] relied on the data of measured BMI or WC. Hearing loss was measured by pure tone audiometry in 11 studies [
19,
21‐
24,
26‐
28,
30‐
32] and self-reported in three studies [
20,
25,
29]. The cut-points (frequencies and threshold) used to define hearing loss slightly varied across the studies. The WHO defines hearing loss as pure-tone thresholds of 25 dB or higher in the better ear or both ears [
50]. Thus, the threshold of hearing loss among the included studies that used measured hearing loss was relatively comparable with that of hearing loss according to the WHO definition, with six studies [
21,
24,
26,
27,
30,
32] used 25 dB for hearing loss threshold, three [
19,
22,
31] used 20 dB as the threshold, one [
23] used 26 dB as the threshold, and one [
28] used 40 dB as the threshold. The information regarding the symmetry of hearing loss (unilateral or bilateral hearing loss) was not adequately described in nearly all studies. Thirteen of the 14 included studies were awarded at least seven stars, which indicated good quality studies (Additional files
2 and
3 Table S2-S3).