Abstract
IN the course of an extensive investigation into the measurement of noise, it became clear that the accepted standards of sensitivity of the human ear both on a basis of absolute pressure and subjective loudness needed revision. Previous work on this subject has been largely directed towards telephone conditions of listening, whereas in the more usual case of listening under free ‘space’ conditions, other factors such as the collecting power of the outer ear, and diffraction of the sound waves by the listener's head are involved. In order to obtain representative data, measurements have been made on 48 people of the just inaudible sound pressures at typical frequencies. All the subjects were of normal hearing and the pressures were those measured by a microphone of accurately determined field calibration in the absence of the subject. The figures given in Table I are the modes of the results and, therefore, refer to the most probable values. The subjects were chosen to represent both sexes and ages from fifteen to sixty-five years.
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References
J. Ac. Soc. Am., April, 1932.
J. Gen. Psychol., April, 1930.
Phys. Rev., 29, 588 ; 1927.
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CHURCHER, B., KING, A. Scales of Loudness. Nature 131, 760 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/131760a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/131760a0
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