Abstract
This study aimed to investigate the distracting or masking effects of music tempo and volume, based on subjective evaluation under noise conditions. Two experiments were conducted with 32 participants. In the first one, the experimental conditions were set as follow: (1) the sound pressure levels of music are 45 dB, 60 dB, and 75 dB; (2) music tempos are 70 beats per minute (BPM), 110 BPM, and 150 BPM; (3) sound pressure levels of noise are 45 dB, 60 dB, and 75 dB; and (4) the noise types are talkers’ babble, traffic noise, and construction noise. All conditions on human acoustic perception were analyzed by orthogonal experiment. Based on part one, the second experiment was conducted. Sound pressure levels (50 dB, 60 dB, and 70 dB) of noise and sound pressure levels (50 dB, 60 dB, and 70 dB) of music and music tempo (70 BPM, 110 BPM, and 150 BPM) were assessed by subjective evaluation. The results showed although different types of noise had different effects on human perceptions, noise types had a small effect on acoustic comfort considering the superimposed music. Music can improve the acoustic environment. The sound pressure levels had significant effects on acoustic sensation. The tempo of the music affected the acoustic sensation insignificantly. Sound pressure levels of noise, music tempo, and sound pressure levels of music significantly affect acoustic comfort. The best acoustic environment in this study utilized superimposed 70 BPM, 60 dB music in a 50 dB noise environment. These results suggest that music can enable new strategies to improve indoor environmental satisfaction. Based on the findings, the effect of music on acoustic perceptions under the noise environment should be taken into account when aiming to enhance comfort in noisy environments.
Highlights
Noise is defined as “irrelevant or meaningless data or output occurring along with desired information”, and generally refers to an acoustic phenomenon involving undesirable and disturbing sounds [1,2]
The votes of acoustic perception significantly increased with increasing noise sound pressure level (p < 0.05)
There was a correlation between acoustic sensation and acoustic comfort in the noise environment
Summary
Noise is defined as “irrelevant or meaningless data or output occurring along with desired information”, and generally refers to an acoustic phenomenon involving undesirable and disturbing sounds [1,2]. Noise pollution has been recognized as being among the most disturbing environmental parameters in a variety of epidemiological studies [3,4,5,6] and in a World Health Organization document [7]. Noise is widely present both indoors and outdoors, seriously affecting the environments and human comfort [9,10,11]. Acoustic comfort evaluation is essential in indoor environments, in which the risk of hearing damage is relatively low but annoyance brought by noise noticeably affects subjective health [12,13,14]. Some noise control engineering approaches for reducing noise have been developed [16,17,18,19] These noise control engineering methods were usually not mobile or economically viable
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