Department of Mechanical Engineering, École de technologie supérieure, 1100 Notre-Dame West Street, Montréal, Québec, H1C 1K3, Canada.
Department of Chemincal, Biological, Mechanical and Physical Risk Prevention, Institut de recherche Robert-Sauvé en santé et en sécurité du travail, 505 Boulevard de Maisonneuve West, Montréal, Québec, H3A 3C2, Canada.
J Acoust Soc Am. 2022 Jun;151(6):4086. doi: 10.1121/10.0011696.
The occlusion effect (OE) occurs when the earcanal becomes occluded by an in-ear device, sometimes leading to discomforts experienced by the users due to the augmented perception of physiological noises, or to a distorted perception of one's own voice. The OE can be assessed objectively by measuring the amplification of the low-frequency sound pressure level (SPL) in the earcanal using in-ear microphones. However, as revealed by methodological discrepancies found in past studies, the measurement of this objective occlusion effect (OE) is not standardized. With the goal of proposing a robust yet simple methodology adapted for field assessment, three experimental aspects are investigated: (i) stimulation source and the stimulus's characteristics to induce the phenomenon, (ii) measurement method of the SPL in earcanal, (iii) indicator to quantify the OE. To do so, OE is measured on human participants in laboratory conditions. Results obtained with a specific insert device suggest using the participant's own voice combined with simultaneous measurements of the SPLs based on the noise reduction method and using a single value indicator leads to a simple yet robust methodology to assess OE. Further research is necessary to validate the results with other devices and to generalize the methodology for field assessment.
闭塞效应（OE）发生在耳道被入耳式设备阻塞时，有时会导致用户因生理噪声感知增强或自身声音感知失真而感到不适。OE 可以通过使用入耳式麦克风测量耳道中低频声压级（SPL）的放大来客观评估。然而，正如过去研究中发现的方法差异所揭示的那样，对这种客观闭塞效应（OE）的测量尚未标准化。为了提出一种稳健但简单的适用于现场评估的方法，研究了三个实验方面：（i）刺激源和刺激特性以诱导现象，（ii）耳道中 SPL 的测量方法，（iii）量化 OE 的指标。为此，在实验室条件下对人体参与者进行了 OE 测量。使用特定的插入设备获得的结果表明，使用参与者自己的声音并结合基于降噪方法的 SPL 同时测量，并使用单个值指标，可得出一种简单而稳健的方法来评估 OE。需要进一步的研究来用其他设备验证结果，并将该方法推广到现场评估。
