Development of field methods for assessing auditory situational awareness when using hearing protective equipment in the noisy workplace

开发在嘈杂的工作场所使用听力保护设备时评估听觉态势感知的现场方法

• 批准号: RGPIN-2022-04430
• 负责人: Giguère, Christian
• 金额: $ 2.84万
• 依托单位: University of Ottawa
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=764502
• 关键词: Development; field; methods; assessing; auditory

In many occupational settings, workers are exposed to high levels of noise from machinery and equipment that can adversely impact on hearing health and job safety. While engineering control of noise at the source is the preferred solution, it is not always feasible to reduce noise to safe levels in this way and the use of personal hearing protectors (such as earmuffs and earplugs) often becomes necessary. Current standards on the selection, fit and use of hearing protectors focus on methods to determine the noise attenuation that these devices must provide to satisfy regulatory limits on the maximum daily sound exposure. In focus group meetings, however, concerns are often raised by workers about the lack of auditory situational awareness when working with hearing protectors as these devices can reduce their ability to respond to important sounds from the surrounding environment and interfere with verbal communication. Current standards only provide general guidance regarding communication requirements that is not specific to the individual worker's needs, hearing profile, job requirements or workplace noise. The goal of this research program is to develop auditory tests that can be used by occupational stakeholders to measure the effects of hearing protectors on situational awareness in their own workplaces. The two main objectives are to (1) develop tools to assess speech perception when a given worker wears his/her assigned hearing protector in workplace noise, and to (2) develop a test module to assess the audibility and recognition of critical workplace sounds (e.g., alarms, approaching vehicle sound, acoustic cue from machine malfunction) that are important to ensure safety and efficient operations in the workplace while wearing hearing protectors. Key design requirements for these tests are they could be administered quickly (e.g., <10 min.) in workplace environments and possess good psychometric properties (e.g., test-retest reliability). Experiments with human participants are planned to evaluate the proposed tests. Validation will be conducted over a wide range of adult test participants in terms of age, gender, language proficiency and hearing profile. Overall, this research program will contribute to our basic understanding of the complex interaction between noise, hearing protection and hearing status on auditory perception as well as to the development of practical tools to assist in the selection of hearing protectors that considers both protection and communication needs. This, in turn, will support the development or revision of national and international occupational standard procedures for the optimal selection of hearing protectors.

在许多职业环境中，工人暴露于机器和设备的高噪音，这可能对听力健康和工作安全产生不利影响。虽然工程控制噪音的来源是首选的解决方案，但以这种方式将噪音降低到安全水平并不总是可行的，并且经常需要使用个人听力保护器（例如耳罩和耳塞）。目前关于听力保护器的选择、安装和使用的标准集中在确定这些设备必须提供的噪声衰减的方法上，以满足对最大每日声音暴露的监管限制。然而，在焦点小组会议上，工人们经常担心在使用听力保护器时缺乏听觉情景意识，因为这些设备会降低他们对周围环境中重要声音的反应能力，并干扰语言交流。目前的标准只提供了关于通信要求的一般指导，而不是针对个别工人的需要、听力状况、工作要求或工作场所噪音。这项研究计划的目标是开发听觉测试，可用于职业利益相关者来衡量听力保护器对自己工作场所的情景意识的影响。两个主要目标是（1）开发工具以评估当给定工人在工作场所噪声中佩戴他/她的指定听力保护器时的言语感知，以及（2）开发测试模块以评估关键工作场所声音的可听度和识别（例如，警报、接近车辆的声音、机器故障的声音提示），这些对于确保在工作场所佩戴听力保护器时的安全和有效操作非常重要。这些测试的关键设计要求是它们可以快速管理（例如，<10分钟）在工作场所环境中并且具有良好的心理测量特性（例如，重测信度）。计划与人类参与者进行实验，以评估拟议的测试。验证将在年龄、性别、语言能力和听力状况方面对广泛的成人测试参与者进行。总体而言，这项研究计划将有助于我们对噪声，听力保护和听力状态对听觉感知之间复杂相互作用的基本理解，以及开发实用工具，以帮助选择兼顾保护和沟通需求的听力保护器。这反过来又将支持制定或修订国家和国际职业标准程序，以最佳选择听力保护器。