The Hidden Dangers Of Noise Pollution At Home

Are you reading this at home? Turn off your entertainment for a moment and listen for the sounds around you. What do you hear? Is the refrigerator humming on the other side of the wall? Are you catching the whine of a bathroom fan while your partner showers? Is your teenager’s TV blaring from his room? Is the decades-old clothes washer vibrating across the house during its spin cycle?

Too many homes today are filled with noise pollution and don’t fulfill their ideal role as a sanctuary for residents. If you work or attend classes in a noisy environment all day, coming home to a cacophony of mechanical and electronic sounds can be unpleasant, to put it mildly. For some adults and children, the problems go deeper.

Noise-related Health Issues

The clinical term for a strong reaction to specific sounds is misophonia, explains Ridgefield, Connecticut-based psychologist Roseann Capanna-Hodge, but even individuals without this diagnosis are experiencing noise-related issues, she reports. Capanna-Hodge sees this in her work as a contracted school counselor.

“With the increase in generalized anxiety and disorders such as ADHD and autism, there has been a dramatic increase in children who experience sensory sensitivity.” This often manifests in tantrums and tears among younger kids, and lack of focus among older ones. “Their nerves are stuck on overdrive and sensory experiences such as noise can really produce intense reactions. Add fearful experiences such as school shootings to an already anxious kid’s world, you have even more reactivity,” the psychologist reports.

Philadelphia-based doctor of audiology Anne Dougherty works with patients on the physical aspects of hearing issues. “Any steady state background noise can make hearing and understanding others difficult if it’s loud enough, especially for hearing aid users.” Fortunately, she says, none of these will create long-term hearing issues. They just make it more difficult for conversation and relaxation.

Simple Noise Solutions

“I think the popularity of open floor plans, high ceilings, large windows, hardwood floors, etc., negatively impacts the ability to hear at home,” Dougherty suggests. “But these design elements can be mostly overcome with acoustic treatments, intelligent placement of necessary noise sources, and good communication habits!” She counts the latter as not trying to carry on conversations with people in different areas of the home. The others can be addressed with sound-absorbing surfaces, the hearing doctor notes.

Jaime Derringer, founder and editor of the popular Design Milk online design magazine and e-commerce site, has seen increasing interest in noise cancellation products. “Since we’re getting so much busier, our homes need to be more of a sanctuary than ever before.” Derringer and her team point to new quieter vacuum cleaners, dishwashers and air conditioners as examples of products being touted by manufacturers for their quieter operation.

They’re also seeing night modes in televisions and speaker bars and even “silent alarm clocks using light instead of sound. These have become increasingly popular, eliminating jarring sounds in the morning,” the editor explains.

If you’re building or remodeling your home, there are additional things you can – and should – do to make your home quieter. If you’re working with experienced custom home construction and design professionals, they’re likely suggesting them.

Advanced Noise Solutions

“What people do not realize is the layout of the home makes a huge difference, along with building materials,” shares Pensacola, Florida-based interior designer Cheryl Clendenon. It’s not something most clients think about, she observes, unless there’s a nursery involved. “My goal is to design these issues away from the beginning. We are usually the ones bringing it up.”

This is where expertise makes a difference. Using remote blowers for kitchen vent hoods strong enough to work with a six-burner cooktop, low sone fans in full bathrooms, solid core doors to bedrooms, sound-deadening underlayments below wood flooring, lined window treatments with shutters, and large, soft area rugs. “These decorative items help eliminate the echo you feel in open rooms with nothing to break the sound traveling,” Clendenon advises.

Joe Whitaker, a St. Louis area integrator who helps clients add smart home technology to their living spaces recalls earlier years when noise in his industry was mainly an issue with home theater design. Now professionals like him are likelier to be involved with whole house projects, and at a much earlier stage of the design process. Noise becomes part of a larger conversation with clients, he reports. “Did you know that the sound made by a washer and dryer running can travel through the framing structure of the house and cause vibrations elsewhere? The steady hum of your refrigerator can be distracting and even bad for those who suffer from migraines. Did you know that sound can transfer from one room to other rooms from unsealed wall outlets and light switch locations?” He brings these points up with residential clients regularly, he says.

There are smart home technology manufacturers working on whole house noise solutions, Whitaker reports. The challenge isn’t the smart tech itself, he says, which has become much quieter in recent years. It’s addressing noise from laundry and kitchen appliances, vent fans and other loud home equipment. “Looking at these pollution offenders will help to discover ways to mask, hide, or even eliminate those pesky noises from these rooms, and do it in a design forward method.”

Creating Quiet Space at Home

Whitaker and Clendenon both advocate for quiet wellness spaces at home, shielded from noise and designed to help residents decompress from their high stress lives. “We’re often suggesting a space that becomes a no tech-no TV-no noise zone,” Clendenon says. “It becomes a place to read, mediate or just think. Here on the coast, we often do this outside, with just natural noises present, but in a somewhat-enclosed patio or gazebo type structure. We are working now on a home that will have a detached quiet room with a massage table, water features and other relaxation elements.”

Even if you’re not building or remodeling your home, you can create a quiet, electronics-free space for yourself at home, indoors or out, and the benefits will show up in your well-being. Capanna-Lodge recommends quiet time during the day to rest both brain and body. “By taking 10 to 20 minutes a day to turn off your mind and find that calm rhythm, you give the brain and body a chance to be relaxed.” Relaxation probably sounds great right about now, doesn’t it?

This post first appeared on Forbes.com. To see the original, click here.