Christian Cledera April 28, 2014

How Sound Levels Attenuate with Distance
Lab Report

For our lab we had to how distance affects the loudness of saxophone used. A decibel is a unit used to measure the intensity of a sound. Researchers would be interested in this information. Especially doctors dealing with patients who have a loss of hearing. The way we had done this experiment is by setting 10 meters of tape, each person stands on a meter with their cellphone. With their cellphone that have downloaded an app which acts as a decibel meter. We had then first measured out the ambient noise for a few seconds so we can subtract the ambient from the ambient plus sax part. Then we had measured out the note from the sax being played so we can receive our final answer. The numbers we had gotten have bounced up and down between each meter. Some receiving 90 decibels when they should be receiving around 70. The numbers didn’t seem proper because most cellphones were either too sensitive or not calibrated correctly. Between the two labs we have done (indoors and outdoors) it appears that indoors received a higher decibel rating compared to outdoors. This makes a lot of sense because being indoors it is an enclosed space allowing the noise to bounce off from multiple surfaces, such as the ceiling, the walls, and the floor. But being outdoors it has a higher and more infinite ceiling space and the walls aren’t close enough for the sounds to bounce off