The effects of environmental noise on anxiety level

Forty-five male and female undergraduates were exposed to low (43 dB), medium (61 dB), or high (75 dB) levels of ambient white noise for 30 minutes. Subsequent testing with the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory revealed that mean situational (or state) anxiety was significantly elevated for the 75 dB group, while the variability of these scores increased for both the 61 and 75 dB groups. Habitual (or trait) anxiety measures, however, were not affected by noise. Further testing indicated that essentially the same anxiety/noise relationship occurred in selected subgroups of S s with extreme scores on trait anxiety, neuroticism, extraversion, lie, and intelligence scales. Edsell's data are confirmed and extended by these results, which indicate that even quite moderate environmental noise levels can have undersirable psychological consequences among a wide range of individual S s.