And that means regular exposure to even a few more decibels of noise above moderate levels can trigger reactions that are harmful to health.Īccording to the World Health Organization, average road traffic noise above 53 dB or average aircraft noise exposure above about 45 dB are associated with adverse health effects. That’s because the decibel scale is logarithmic, not linear: With every 10 dB increase, the sense of loudness to the ear generally doubles. A busy street is 19 times as loud, a hair dryer is 66 times as loud, and a freight train is 516 times as loud. We used a professional device called a sound level meter to record the decibel levels of common sounds and environments.Ī chart showing the relative loudness of three sounds compared with a quiet room. Sound is often measured on a scale of decibels, or dB, in which near total silence is zero dB and a firecracker exploding within a meter of the listener is about 140 dB. In fact, noise may trigger immediate heart attacks: Higher levels of aircraft noise exposure in the two hours preceding nighttime deaths have been tied to heart-related mortality. The associations remained even after researchers adjusted for other environmental and behavioral factors that could contribute to poor cardiac health, like air pollution, socioeconomic factors, and smoking. When researchers analyzed the brain scans and health records of hundreds of people at Massachusetts General Hospital, they made a stunning discovery: Those who lived in areas with high levels of transportation noise were more likely to have highly activated amygdalas, arterial inflammation and - within five years - major cardiac events. Is your life noisy? Tell us about the noise in your life and learn an easy way to measure it.
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