A review about hearing protection comfort and its evaluation

Though it should ideally be the last choice in terms of noise exposure reduction, hearing protection devices (HPDs) remain the most commonly used noise control solution. However, the lack of comfort of HPDs can make it difficult for the worker to consistently and correctly wear them during work shift. It can thereby decrease their effective protection. Numerous studies have addressed the comfort of HPDs since the late fifties. These works mainly differ on (i) their definition of “comfort”, (ii) how “comfort” is measured (questionnaires), (iii) their measurement conditions (laboratory versus field, naive versus experienced wearers, type of tested HPDs…) and finally, (iv) their conclusions. The objective of this paper is to propose a comprehensive literature review of these works and to put them into perspective regarding a definition of HPD comfort based on three main components: (1) the physical one which is related to the human perception of the acoustical, biomechanical and thermal interactions between ...