Design of Alarm Sound of Home Care Equipment Based on Age-related Auditory Sense.

Abstract

A wide variety of home care equipment has been developed to support the independent lifestyle and care taking of elderly persons. Almost all of the equipment has an alarm designed to alert a care person or to sound a warning in case of an emergency. Due to the fact that aging human beings' senses physiologically, weaken and deteriorate, each alarm's sound must be designed to account for the full range of elderly person's hearing loss. Since the alarms are usually heard indoors, it is also necessary to evaluate the relationship between the basic characteristics of the sounds and living area's layout. In this study, we investigated the sounds of various alarms of the home care equipment based on both the age-related hearing characteristics of elderly persons and the propagation property of the sounds indoors. As a result, it was determined that the hearing characteristics of elderly persons are attuned to sounds which have a frequency from 700 Hz to 1 kHz, and it was learned that the indoor absorption ratio of sound is smallest when the frequency is 1 kHz. Therefore, a frequency of 1 kHz is good for the alarm sound of home care equipment. A flow chart to design the alarm sound of home care equipment was proposed, taking into account the extent of age related auditory sense deterioration.