Results of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health – U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Interlaboratory Comparison of American National Standards Institute S12.6–1997 Methods A and B

Details

• Personal Author:
  Ahroon WA ; Berger E ; Byrne, David C. ; Gauger D ; Gerges SNY ; Krieg EF ; McKinley R ; Murphy, William J. ; Witt B
• Description:
  The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and the Environmental Protection Agency sponsored the completion of an interlaboratory study to compare two fitting protocols specified by ANSI S12.6-1997 (R2002) [(2002). American National Standard Methods for the Measuring Real-Ear Attenuation of Hearing Protectors, American National Standards Institute, New York]. Six hearing protection devices (two earmuffs, foam, premolded, custom-molded earplugs, and canal-caps) were tested in six laboratories using the experimenter-supervised, Method A, and (naïve) subject-fit, Method B, protocols with 24 subjects per laboratory. Within-subject, between-subject, and between-laboratory standard deviations were determined for individual frequencies and A-weighted attenuations. The differences for the within-subject standard deviations were not statistically significant between Methods A and B. Using between-subject standard deviations from Method A, 3-12 subjects would be required to identify 6-dB differences between attenuation distributions. Whereas using between-subject standard deviations from Method B, 5-19 subjects would be required to identify 6-dB differences in attenuation distributions of a product tested within the same laboratory. However, the between-laboratory standard deviations for Method B were -0.1 to 3.0 dB less than the Method A results. These differences resulted in considerably more subjects being required to identify statistically significant differences between laboratories for Method A (12-132 subjects) than for Method B (9-28 subjects). [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Hearing Hearing Loss Hearing Loss, Noise-Induced Noise Noise, Occupational Occupational Health Personal Protective Equipment Safety
• Keywords:
  Author Keywords: ANSI Standards Ear Protection Hearing Hearing-conservation Hearing-disorders Hearing-impairment Hearing-loss Hearing-protection Noise (working Environment) Noise-induced-hearing-loss Noise-protection Noise Pollution Occupational Health Occupational Safety Personal-protection Personal-protective-equipment Safety Devices Standards

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• ISSN:
  0001-4966
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Alabama ; California ; Indiana ; Massachusetts ; Ohio ; OSHA Region 1 ; OSHA Region 4 ; OSHA Region 5 ; OSHA Region 9
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  DART - Division of Applied Research and Technology
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Volume:
  125
• Issue:
  5
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20035378
• Citation:
  J Acoust Soc Am 2009 May; 125(5):3262-3277
• Contact Point Address:
  William J. Murphy, Hearing Loss Prevention Team, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, 4676 Columbia Parkway, MS C-27, Cincinnati, Ohio 45226-1998
• Email:
  wmurphy@cdc.gov
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2009
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Source Full Name:
  Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:06d901795896b0e06b6d845b7037e6cef3a3ed392439474b35daa080e4c41e5d8e52670717ac2e65cc02e4ec7ef580cf1e68768f8ffdaa042d54ee0d5e34a6c3
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/187259/cdc_187259_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 230.28 KB ]