Effects of synthetic and eco-friendly sound absorbers on perceived speech intelligibility ratings in a simulated open-plan office

Abstract

The concept behind open-plan offices is based on promoting collaboration and dynamic interactions between workers. However, these spaces can be disruptive and noisy, with irrelevant speech ranking as one of the main elements of distraction and annoyance. To tackle the problem and reduce noise in the workplace, synthetic sound absorbers are frequently employed as one of the passive acoustic strategies. However, these materials have a significant carbon footprint since their manufacture depends on non-renewable raw materials or requires high energy consumption. Alternatively, eco-friendly sound absorbers can replace synthetic ones to improve the acoustic quality of open-plan offices. This article explores this topic, examining the impact that alternative sound absorbers have on the perceived acoustic quality of open-plan offices, compared to traditional synthetic sound absorbers. For this purpose, a real open-plan office was measured following ISO 3382-3 and the data was used to create a precise acoustic model of the room in the ODEON® software. The acoustic performance of the office with synthetic and non-traditional materials in the ceiling and screens was obtained by software simulations. To assess listeners’ perception of the acoustic quality with different sound absorbers, listening tests were conducted in which participants were exposed to auralized sounds of room acoustic simulations for each type of material. The results showed that eco-friendly sound absorbers have comparable sound attenuation to synthetic materials, and therefore the potential to be implemented in open-plan offices. Statistical analysis of the listening tests indicated that the acoustic quality of the room with eco-friendly sound absorbers is perceived in a similar way to that of synthetic sound absorbers.