• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2008.04a
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• pp.268-271
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• 2008

A sound-masking technique was applied to the urban public spaces with multiple noises in order to reduce the annoyance of the construction and traffic noise. In addition, the effects of masking system were investigated in order to improve the soundscape. In several urban spaces, building construction and nearby road traffic noise were recorded using a head and torso simulator and sound quality (SQ) system which specifies the spectral and temporal aspects of the noises. The sound-masking system which consists of the distributed speakers and control devices was applied to the boundaries of the construction sites. Synthesized masking sounds were produced with consideration of SQ characteristics of the multiple noise. Subjective evaluations on the soundscape were conducted to verify effectiveness of the system under the conditions with and without the masker sounds.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.19-33
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• 1998

The primary objective of this research was to develop optimal models for masking the road traffic noise with the sound of a waterfall at urban small green spaces. Noise levels were measured at 8 roadside green spaces in SEOUL and questionnaires were randomly distributed to 40 users for evaluating the noise at each site at the same time. College students participated in the experiment for the development of masking models and the developed models were tested by users at 2 green spaces. The major results are as follows ; 1. Traffic noises ranged from 65dBto 70 dB. Users' satisfaction with the noise became considerably low on the basis of 60 dB and it was highly related to noise level. 2. Noise was a main factor to depreciate the amenity of green spaces where its level was more than 60 dB and so it neds to be excluded or reduced the traffic noise at the process of design. 3. Masking effects kept constant independent of the spatial location of masker on condition that masker levels were equal. It was effective when masker was 5-10dB greater than noise level which was masked. 4. As noise level went up, satisfaction ratings about the masked noise became low but masking effects increased in proportion to its level. 5. It was proved that the models were valid through the field experiment.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.521-528
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• 2011

A variety of noise control methods have been developed as an interest on noise issues increases. Among them, noise control methods using masking effect, a phenomenon to reduce the ability to notice the unwanted sound by proper sound, to implement a pleasant sound environment have been studied under the name of soundscape. We proposed a novel vector base amplitude panning(VBAP) based noise control method to apply to the building environment. The proposed method could improve the amenity inside the building to reproduce the sounds with excellent masking effect on the incoming path of noise using the control speakers, considering the direction of noise source. The directional masking sounds can be generated by using VBPA technique. To verify the performance of the proposed method, we carried out the subjective test for the degree of amenity according to direction of the masking sound. Subjective test results showed that it is possible to improve the amenity inside the building by controlling the direction of masking sound considering the human's auditory characteristic.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2005.05a
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• pp.599-602
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• 2005

This paper describes a experimental study determining the effects of the type and loudness of introducing sounds on the amenity and the masking degree of background noise. 132 relative test sounds with 11 types of introducing sounds and 3 steps of road traffic noise were presented to 29 subjects through headphone in the laboratory experiment. Seven scale of polar adjective such as 'Strong Weak', 'Pleasant Unpleasant', 'Clear Unclear', 'Suitable Unsuitable', 'Comfortable-Discomfortable' was employed for the evaluation of amenity. And Seven scale of mono polar adjective such as 'Very-Not at all' was employed for the evaluation of masking degree against road traffic noise. The results are as follows; Green music was evaluated the highest amenity among test sounds and murmurs of a stream, signal music, song of a bird, crying of insect was showed the amenity rank of order. The softer and weaker introducing sound was evaluated more suitable and comfortable under the road traffic noise. So adequate level of introducing sounds was considered for the desirable urban soundscape. Also the louder sounds compared to background noises had greater masking effects. But similar levels of introducing sounds were recommended considering both good amenity and masking effects.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.367-372
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• 2012

This paper introduces noise masking algorithm for 64 channel digital hearing aid. 125 Hz spectral resolution is maintained for 64 channels from 125 Hz to 8000 Hz. The same spectral masking processing effects as the cochlea are considered and applied for the present hearing aid noise reduction processing algorithm. Theoretical algorithm has been ported into assembler language program software and been embedded into a DSP IC chip for the digital hearing aid. Some parts of noise masking software program code are explained, and the results of the real-time noise reduction are verified by electro-acoustic measurements.

• Proceedings of the Acoustical Society of Korea Conference
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• spring
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• pp.335-336
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• 2000

A psychoacoustic model based noise shaping method is proposed, where noise's presence with a host signal will not be perceptually noticeable. The derivation of imperceptible noise levels from the masking thresholds of the signal involves a deconvolution associated with the spreading function in the psychoacoustic model, which results in an ill-conditioned problem. In this paper, the problem is formulated as a constrained optimization, and it is demonstrated that the solution provides noise shaping where the noise excitation level conforms to the masking thresholds of the signal.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.18 no.3E
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• pp.3-8
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• 1999

In speech recognition for real-world applications, the performance degradation due to the mismatch introduced between training and testing environments should be overcome. In this paper, to reduce this mismatch, we provide a hybrid method of spectral subtraction and residual noise masking. We also employ multiple model approach to obtain improved robustness over various noise environments. In this approach, multiple model sets are made according to several noise masking levels and then a model set appropriate for the estimated noise level is selected automatically in recognition phase. According to speaker independent isolated word recognition experiments in car noise environments, the proposed method using model sets with only two masking levels reduced average word error rate by 60% in comparison with spectral subtraction method.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.121-128
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to confirm the impact of noise on subject accomplishment as well as physical/mental load, and evaluates the effects of noise-masking and earplug. 15 college students participate in the test, and the comparison is performed by executing four projects according to conditional categories of noise environments; control condition, noise condition, earplug condition, and noise-masking condition. Noise in the field site of the H manufacturer was used as the noise source, the general job aptitude test which consist of linguistic ability, math ability, perception ability, reasoning ability was used as the task of this project. To estimate physical/mental load evaluation, we used the heart rate R-R interval, Criteria flicker fusion frequency(CFF) and measured NASA-TLX workload for subjective evaluation. As the research outcome, it is shown that there is a meaningful difference for the project task score, dropping rate of CFF, the heart rate, and NASA-TLX subjective evaluation score according to conditions of noise environment. Therefore, the impact of noise on capability of subject accomplishment as well as physical/mental load was confirmed along with the effects of using earplug and noise-masking.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2013.04a
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• pp.116-121
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• 2013

Panaroma Sun roof's sun shade motor elicits two major sounds when operating: the tonal sound and the white noises. Generally, the sound related to the sharpness contributes the most to the quality of motors' tonal sound. The primary purpose of this study was to set the loudness of the motor's objective tonal sound utilizing the masking effect by its white noises. To conduct this study, the sound made by the operating sun shade motor was categorized into two different subsets of masker and test tone to examine the masking threshold. Also, the shifts of masking threshold were observed with the varying masker loudness.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.20 no.2E
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• pp.9-16
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• 2001

A psychoacoustic model based noise shaping method which shapes the noise in the frequency domain is proposed, where its presence with a host signal will not be perceptually noticeable. The derivation of imperceptible noise levels from the masking thresholds of the signal involves a deconvolution associated with the spreading function in the psychoacoustic model, which results in an ill-conditioned problem. In this paper, the problem is formulated as a constrained optimization, and it is demonstrated that the solution provides noise shaping where the noise excitation level conforms to the masking thresholds of the signal, and thus the noises embedded in the signal will not be perceived by human ear.