Annoyance and acceptability judgments produced by 32 aircraft noise conditions

Abstract

The varying effects of aircraft noise and human response variables on annoyance responses were measured in a major laboratory study of 384 subjects. About half of all variance in annoyance is explained by level and spectrum of noise, type of subject's activity, and real environment exposures. Level of noise accounts for 30% of all variance and 60% of all explained variance. Type of subject's activity accounts for 12% and his type of real environment exposure accounts for 8% of explained variance. Annoyance under TV viewing and listening was greater than under rest and relaxation. Residents normally exposed to lower levels of aircraft noise were more annoyed by noise than residents living closer to the airport and regularly exposed to higher noise levels. The correlation between Leq and 1536 annoyance judgments was r = 0.53, with each unit of annoyance on a 0–9 scale associated with 6.25 units of Leq. One experimental condition which included full retrofit of 747s and 727s and replacement of noisy 707s by quieter L‐1011s, was still found unacceptable by two‐thirds of subjects for close level exposures.