Or, the better question is how fast does the ear grow as we age. Apparently this research topic was published in 1995 in the British Medical Journal. The British researcher measured the ear length of 200 patients and discovered that not only do old men really did have big ears but also that ears grow about 2mm per decade after age 30. This research won the 2017 Ig Prize for Anatomy . Source Why do old men have big ears? BMJ. 1995 Dec 23-30;311(7021):1668.