PMID- 32113303
OWN - NLM
STAT- PubMed-not-MEDLINE
DCOM- 20200826
LR  - 20200826
IS  - 1520-8524 (Electronic)
IS  - 0001-4966 (Linking)
VI  - 147
IP  - 2
DP  - 2020 Feb
TI  - Observations on the correlation of subjective and objective attenuation 
      measurements on earplugs.
PG  - 941
LID - 10.1121/10.0000689 [doi]
AB  - Real-ear attenuation at threshold (REAT) has been recognized as the gold-standard 
      method to evaluate the attenuation of hearing protection devices (HPDs). The 
      question is often posed as to whether or not REAT measurements could be replaced 
      with objective, insertion loss (IL) measurements conducted on acoustical test 
      fixtures for assessing the performance and consistency of HPDs. To understand how 
      IL data correspond to REAT data for earplugs, both methods were used to assess 
      three earplugs. The resulting data were compared, and the HPD attenuation ranked 
      at each frequency. In most cases, after correction for bone conduction limits, 
      occlusion effect, and physiological noise, IL data show good agreement with REAT 
      values. Discrepancies at some frequencies were found and varied by HPD. The IL 
      data did not identify the high standard deviation of the REAT results on one 
      earplug. The IL data did not correspond well to the REAT values, resulting in 
      differences as large as 12 dB at some frequencies. In conclusion, IL and REAT 
      procedures are used for different purposes when assessing attenuation 
      characteristics of HPDs. While close agreement was found at most frequencies, IL 
      data may not reflect the REAT performance of HPDs equivalently in all aspects.
FAU - Liu, Yufei
AU  - Liu Y
AD  - Personal Safety Division of 3M China Limited, Number 9 Nanxiang Er Road, Science 
      City, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510663, People's Republic of China.
FAU - Wells, Lauraine
AU  - Wells L
AD  - Personal Safety Division of 3M Company, 3M Center, Building 0235-02-W-75, Saint 
      Paul, Minnesota 55144-1000, USA.
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PL  - United States
TA  - J Acoust Soc Am
JT  - The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
JID - 7503051
SB  - IM
EDAT- 2020/03/03 06:00
MHDA- 2020/03/03 06:01
CRDT- 2020/03/02 06:00
PHST- 2020/03/02 06:00 [entrez]
PHST- 2020/03/03 06:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2020/03/03 06:01 [medline]
AID - 10.1121/10.0000689 [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - J Acoust Soc Am. 2020 Feb;147(2):941. doi: 10.1121/10.0000689.