Study of Increased Wind Noise by Active Noise Cancellation Headphones

Abstract

In this paper, we investigated the cause of the increased wind noise by the active noise cancellation (ANC) headphones under windy conditions. Initially, we conducted experiments comparing both feedforward and feedback types of ANC under windy conditions. Subsequently, we formulated a hypothesis for the cause of amplified wind noise in ANC headphones as follows: The feedforward type ANC may introduce additional noise into the user's eardrum when its microphone, used for feedforward control, captures low acoustic power sounds. To validate this hypothesis, we conducted experiments using reproduced wind noise sounds played using a speaker (high acoustic power) or an earphone (low acoustic power) with feedforward type ANC headphones. Our findings provide robust confirmation that the experimental results align with and support our proposed hypothesis.