Effect of varying corridor parameters on signal-to-noise ratio in classrooms

Abstract

Corridors have a crucial effect on classroom acoustics, but its study is generally ignored. After examining the acoustic performance of a coupled space comprising a corridor and two classrooms, a new method for calculating the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) by the analysis of the energy distribution is proposed in this paper. Numerical experiments are conducted using the finite element software COMSOL Multiphysics. Various parameters are explored using the proposed numerical model to determine their effect on the SNR at different receiving points in a classroom. It was observed that factors such as the corridor width, absorption of the corridor carpet materials, and aperture area (i.e., classroom doors) affect room acoustics. The results show that an absorption treatment of the corridor has a significant effect on classroom acoustic performance. The findings of this study help us understand various metrics of acoustic performance in extended coupled spaces, such as speech intelligibility in classrooms and offices.