Sound attenuation of earmuffs under conditions of impulsive noise—laboratory measurements

Abstract The attenuation of earmuffs for high level impulsive noise was measured on a human head in (1) an anechoic room and (2) a reverberation room. Different definitions of the effective attenuation of impulse noise are discussed. The measurements showed that the sound attenuation of an earmuff in a reverberation field is higher than in the free field at comparable impulsive noise levels. A non-linearity caused by the cushion leads to a decrease of the attenuation with increasing peak level.