The influence of spatialized background noise on ease of hearing in rooms

Abstract

The influence of irrelevant noise on worker’s performance has not yet been studied from the standpoint of spatialized background noise in rooms. This paper presents the detriment to Ease of Hearing due to spatial auditory events produced by intruding sound in open plan offices. Auralization is used to represent a generic open plan office noise environment that includes HVAC noise, an intruding voice, and a focus voice. Two different speech communication environments are presented to the listener. In the first presentation, the intruding voice is located far from the listener’s workstation (in the reverberant field) and is not localizable. In the second presentation, the intruding voice is localized near the listener’s workstation. The focus voice is localized in front of the listener for both presentations. These sounds are played over a five-channel auralization system. Listeners are tested for the degree of Ease of Hearing (EOH) of the focus voice. Psycho-acoustical test results are presented to show the difference between the Ease of Hearing in each case. Improvement strategies to keep high quality communication are also presented based on the results.