Effects of low speed wind on the recognition/identification and pass-through communication tasks of auditory situation awareness afforded by military hearing protection/enhancement devices and tactical communication and protective systems

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the effect of controlled low-speed wind-noise on the auditory situation awareness performance afforded by military hearing protection/enhancement devices (HPED) and tactical communication and protective systems (TCAPS). Design: Recognition/identification and pass-through communications tasks were separately conducted under three wind conditions (0, 5, and 10 mph). Subjects wore two in-ear-type TCAPS, one earmuff-type TCAPS, a Combat Arms Earplug in its ‘open’ or pass-through setting, and an EB-15LE™ electronic earplug. Devices with electronic gain systems were tested under two gain settings: ‘unity’ and ‘max’. Testing without any device (open ear) was conducted as a control. Study sample: Ten subjects were recruited from the student population at Virginia Tech. Audiometric requirements were 25 dBHL or better at 500, 1000, 2000, 4000, and 8000 Hz in both ears. Results: Performance on the interaction of communication task-by-device was significantly different only in 0 mph wind speed. The between-device performance differences varied with azimuthal speaker locations. Conclusions: It is evident from this study that stable (non-gusting) wind speeds up to 10 mph did not significantly degrade recognition/identification task performance and pass-through communication performance of the group of HPEDs and TCAPS tested. However, the various devices performed differently as the test sound signal speaker location was varied and it appears that physical as well as electronic features may have contributed to this directional result.

Key Words:

• Auditory situation awareness
• wind effects
• wind screens
• hearing protection
• TCAPS
• HPED
• DRILCOM
• auditory perception

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful for the funding provided by the Office of Naval Research, and Kurt Yankaskas, Contract Technical Officer, for the addition of wind noise to the DRILCOM test protocol. The Department of Defense provided the funding for the DRILCOM test protocol development.

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest.