Perception of noisiness in various professionals exposed to occupational noise

Abstract

Introduction: To determine the exposed noise levels and perceptual noisiness scores of various professionals who are prone to develop occupational hearing loss. Further, the relationship between perceptual noisiness scores and measured noise levels was assessed in the study. Methods: Initially, the exposed noise levels of different professions were evaluated (traffic police, bus drivers, auto-rickshaw drivers, vendors, and office workers). The “Noise at Work Questionnaire” was used to assess the noise perception scores under five different domains. Results: SPSS (version 21) was used to analyze the data. Levene test showed homogeneity of variance maintained for noise exposure levels across professionals, following which MANOVA was used. Shapiro–Wilk test for perceptual noisiness scores showed nonnormal distribution, following which Kruskal–Wallis test and Mann–Whitney U-test were performed for group-wise and pairwise comparisons, respectively. Further, Spearman's correlation for noise exposure and noisiness scores was done. The results pertaining to exposed noise levels revealed that the bus drivers (80.42 dB A) were exposed to high noise levels, whereas the office workers (52.4 dB A) had the least. In terms of perceptual noisiness scores, the results revealed a significantly better difference between the groups in the following aspects: benefits (χ2 [4] = 18.679), barriers (χ2 [4] = 10.828), self-efficacy (χ2 [4] = 21.318), attitude (χ2 [4] = 16.233), susceptibility (χ2 [4] = 25.006). Furthermore, there was a negative correlation between the noise exposure levels and the perceptual noisiness scores. Conclusions: In spite of the high noise levels being measured, the bus drivers had the least noisiness scores among the groups, indicating negative attitudes in terms of perceptions which pose as a barrier to preventive measures. The alarming observation made was that 100% of individuals in the study had the least knowledge on the use of Ear protective Devices (EPDs).