journal-article

It is well known that hearing in noisy situations is more challenging than in quiet environments. This holds true for adults and …

The ability to focus ones attention in different acoustical environments has been thoroughly investigated in the past. However, recent …

This contribution is part of the research topic ‘Acoustics in the Built Environment: a Challenge for Improving the Quality of Life’. It presents results from an extensive room acoustics and long-term in-isut measurements in primary schools and preschools in Germany, i.e., classrooms and playrooms, respectively. Measurement setup included adult and child HATSs in comparison to an omnidirectional microphone. Results highlight some of the nuances in the choice of transducers in measurements and potential benefits of psychoacoustic parameters when more comprehensively characterizing the noise environments in educational institution from children’s perspectives.

Development of a new paradigm to investigate children’s intentional switching of auditory selective attention in noisy and spatial sound environments using plausible sound reproduction methods. Results revealed similar auditory attention flexibility between children (6-10 years old) and young adults (18-26 years old). It was observed adults benefited from spatial cues when selecting relevant information while this was not found to the same extent in children. Furthermore, children were shown to be more sensitive to noise by concluding faster in noise trials while taking errors into account.