Improvement of Zwicker’s psychoacoustic annoyance model aiming at tonal noises

Abstract According to 4 acoustical parameters of noise samples (i.e., loudness, sharpness, fluctuation strength and roughness), Zwicker’s psychoacoustic annoyance model can be used to estimate the relative degree of noise annoyance. However, this model cannot be well applied to compare the annoyance degrees of tonal noises and atonal noises. In order to improve its estimation effect on tonal noises, 3 groups of noise samples were selected randomly, i.e., 27 low-frequency tonal noise samples induced by a 1000 kV transformer with A-weighted equivalent sound pressure levels ranging from 41.2 dBA to 73.0 dBA; 30 low-, mid- or high-frequency tonal/atonal noise samples with loudness levels ranging from 60 phon to 80 phon; and 60 other noise samples with A-weighted equivalent sound pressure levels ranging from 40.7 dBA to 75.0 dBA. Laboratory listening tests were conducted on the above 3 sample groups respectively via an 11-point numerical scale. The Zwicker’s psychoacoustic annoyance model was improved by taking tonality into account, and introducing the evaluation result of the first noise sample group (1000 kV transformer noise samples) to determine the coefficients in the model. The applicability of the improved model was examined by the evaluation results of the other two groups as well as the data in a previous research on annoyance of 220 kV/500 kV transformer noises. Results show that the improved model can estimate the relative annoyance degrees caused by various types of tonal/atonal noises much more accurately.