Loudness of Structure-Borne Sound Heard Directly by Ear Put on Vibrating Structure

Putting an ear close to a vibrating structure like a wall or a floor, we are able to hear structure-borne sounds clearly, but the loudness of such sounds has never been studied quantitatively. In this study, subjective experiments were carried out in order to obtain the relationship between loudness and the vibration amplitude of the ear's contact surface at low audible frequencies. The main result of this study is that the loudness of a structure-borne sound is almost equal to that of an air-borne sound with a sound pressure level 20 dB higher than the vibration velocity level (ref=5×10−8 m/s) of the surface. According to this result, the loudness of the structure-borne sound heard directly can be evaluated as a sound pressure level derived from the measured vibration amplitude of the structure.