You know how sometimes you're all turned up at a live performance concert or something, and the music is really loud, but when you leave your ears are ringing and you're like "Ow, my ears hurt"? Well, scientists use something called the A-weighted loudness scale to measure how loud sounds are, but they take into account how our ears actually hear sounds, not just how loud they are.
This is all because our ears are more sensitive to some frequencies (or pitches) of sound than others. So if you have two equally loud sounds, but one has a lot of high-pitched sounds and the other has a lot of low-pitched sounds, the one with the high-pitched sounds will sound louder to us.
That's where the A-weighted scale comes in. It adjusts the measurements of sound to take into account how our ears hear different frequencies. The A-weighted scale is the most commonly used to measure noise levels, like in workplaces or cities. It goes from 0 (i.e., the threshold of hearing) to about 115 - 140 dB SPL (i.e., the threshold of pain). Anyway, next time you're at a concert or a loud place, remember that even if the sound doesn't seem that loud, it could still damage your ears!
This is all because our ears are more sensitive to some frequencies (or pitches) of sound than others. So if you have two equally loud sounds, but one has a lot of high-pitched sounds and the other has a lot of low-pitched sounds, the one with the high-pitched sounds will sound louder to us.
That's where the A-weighted scale comes in. It adjusts the measurements of sound to take into account how our ears hear different frequencies. The A-weighted scale is the most commonly used to measure noise levels, like in workplaces or cities. It goes from 0 (i.e., the threshold of hearing) to about 115 - 140 dB SPL (i.e., the threshold of pain). Anyway, next time you're at a concert or a loud place, remember that even if the sound doesn't seem that loud, it could still damage your ears!
