Effect of combined noise sources on speech intelligibility in urban spaces

Abstract

The effect of combined noise sources on speech intelligibility in urban spaces was investigated. Road traffic and stationary/non-stationary construction noises were convolved with the impulse responses recorded from an urban square. Listening tests were conducted, when the construction noises in combination with road traffic noise were presented, obtaining word intelligibility scores and listening difficulty ratings. The results indicated that mean intelligibility scores and listening difficulty ratings for the stationary construction noise were significantly related to the noise levels, whereas, those for the non-stationary construction noise were not affected by the noise levels. It was confirmed that the temporal level variations as well as the level of combined noise sources affect the speech intelligibility in urban spaces.