WHITE NOISE:
This is something I (Stan) began to study many years ago. Back then I had read somewhere that this kind of sound is very soothing to listen to, and seeing as I was a person of a passionate disposition, I thought I would see exactly what this kind of random noise could do for me to calm my nerves when I needed them to be calm.
EXACTLY WHAT IS WHITE NOISE?:
White noise is a mix of every sound and noise in the world; it contains every frequency we are capable of hearing. So what does it sound like? Well... like everything and nothing. It is the sound of wind as it rushes through trees, the sound of steady rain, the sound of a mother gently saying "shhhhh..." to her baby, the continuous sound of the seashore if you live near the sea, the sound of a waterfall, the sound you hear when you hold a seashell close to your ear (remember your mother telling you that you could hear the sound of the sea when you held a seashell close to your ear?).
IS WHITE NOISE FOUND ONLY IN NATURE?
No, it can be artificially produced in a sound studio by special electronic equipment and recorded directly to a CD or other audio medium for later listening in the home or office. Always though, white noise, however produced, is for sure a hissing, roaring, rushing, shhh, kind of sound.
ARTIFICIALLY-PRODUCED white noise is a very steady sound. It doesn't vary or waver in intensity at all.
However, when NATURE produces white noise by wind, rain, or sea, there is a random slight shift in sound level which goes on all the time (except that the rush of a waterfall tends to be a steady sound). This NATURAL white noise sound especially, with the slight variation in it, is very COMFORTING to the human ear. (Choose one of the following explanations for this comforting aspect of white noise that is in harmony with your belief system: 1 - we evolved over millions of years to become used to a constant low level of white noise in our natural environment so that sound is deeply calming and non-threatening to us / 2 - when God made the universe and put humans on the earth, His compassion gave us an appreciation of the natural and non-threatening nature of the God-given sounds of His natural world all around us, which we call today "white noise").
WHY PEOPLE MIGHT WANT SOOTHING WHITE NOISE AROUND THEM:
A background of white noise, whether made by human or nature, has a powerful effect of peace and relaxation on people. White noise, when used as a soft background noise, say, in the home, will also help drown out unwanted noises from outside to a perhaps surprising degree, but its primary use is not always to drown out the racket coming at you through your windows when all you really want is some peace and quiet. A couple of anecdotes follow:
THE COMPUTER BUSINESS AND THE MOTORWAY RAMP:
About 40 years ago, a computer software business in Wellington New Zealand all of a sudden had a problem with traffic noise when a new motorway ramp was built right by the building. Sound engineers were brought in, and quickly discounted ideas like providing added sound insulation or walling up the windows to keep the noise out, etc. Eventually, they came up with a cost-effective plan to put a soft background of constant white noise through the office public address system.
This soft sound covered the harsh distracting din of the motorway traffic and allowed the computer software developers to continue their important mental concentration in perceived peace and quiet. How So? In this particular application the white noise was indeed used as a cover up for the traffic noise outside the windows, and here is also how the special quality of white noise saved the day for the computer company:
White noise may in fact be quite loud, but it doesn't sound loud (unless one goes overboard with the volume control...), it tends to sound soft, gentle - "user-friendly", if you like. But as it was set loud enough to drown out the random traffic noise, all the software developers ended up hearing was, at first, a perceived soft and gentle sound of white noise. Then, white noise being perceived by the brain as a completely non-threatening sound from nature from the moment humans first walked the earth eons ago, that perceived "friendly" sound was "tuned out" by the brain and, so far as the software developers perceived it, they were doing their work in perfect natural quietness.
This story is true. It was written up in the Wellington daily newspapers at the time, as an innovative solution to a traffic noise problem. The company was the Sperry computer company - a major international player in those days, and their address was Greenock House, The Terrace, Wellington. I worked for the company for a while.
In my (Stan's) humble opinion, this use of noise to make silence was not magic, but the pragmatic, practical application of white noise to make a perceived quiet background for the staff and thus solve a real-world urban problem - and it happened to work! (and as I recall all these years later, the white noise - more accurately they termed it "pink"* noise - was artificially generated by electronics, but I cannot swear to that now). (* To explain simply, "pink" noise is white noise with a boosted lower register).
MOTHERS and BABIES:
It so happened years ago, in my empirical research in to white noise, I began to hear and read anecdotes from a few mothers who had found a way to solve their distress over their failures to put their babies down to sleep - and the babies in turn, becoming progressively over-tired and grumpy, would also become distressed - until those mothers began to use white noise in the nursery at sleep times. That was one reason that prompted me to make a natural white noise CD and market it to mothers.
And, so gratifying for all concerned, every single mother who reported back to me about her use of white noise, told me it helped her baby into happy, peaceful sleep without any fuss. No mother ever told me it did not work. So mothers, while I have no peer-reviewed formal scientific research to prove that white noise is great for putting babies to sleep, I surely do have some very grateful-sounding positive feedback from New Zealand mothers with healthy happy babies (email me if you want and for a small cost I will send you a CD of natural White Noise).
My WHISPERINGS OF THE PACIFIC CD:
Although long ago I had built an electronic generator of white noise and turned it on in my own city dwelling to see what would happen, eventually living with it at a low sound level for years day and night except when driving or visiting, I nevertheless wanted to use a natural source of white noise for the CDs I made years ago, figuring - for no particular reason - that Mother Nature might somehow be a better provider of it than my rock-steady artificial electronic machine.
The ONLY sound on my early Whisperings of the Pacific CDs was the natural white noise sound of the world's largest ocean, the "Peaceful Ocean" (Pacific). On a cold winter's night in July 2005 in coastal Christchurch New Zealand, I stood near Cave Rock on the beach with my portable recording equipment as dusk fell. I chose winter, and dusk, because I did not want any people, dogs or cars around to make distracting sounds on my recording. Even the seagulls were away somewhere else. Mother Nature offered up a calm night, not much wind, as the ocean quietly spoke to me. This made for a remarkably steady recorded sound in spite of the fact that waves gently breaking on the shoreline were making the sound. There are of course small variations in sound level as would be perfectly normal in natural white noise. Sometimes the lapping waves did create minor changes in volume or tone as they ebbed and flowed around Cave Rock. Nothing was added or changed about the recording; it was left exactly as first recorded at Cave Rock. and this is the very same sound that the babies in their nurseries in the above anecdote went to sleep by...
That white noise CD was 1 hour long. It's good to help grownups to get off to sleep, so I was told...
PINK NOISE / WHITE NOISE:
Everything I have written about white noise on this page, also is true for pink noise. In the audio profession, both are recognised as being a full spectrum of all sounds that there are, all mixed in together. The difference is that pink noise has a bassier sound to it, its energy decreases per octave. White noise by contrast has equal energy all the way up through the octaves.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
This is something I (Stan) began to study many years ago. Back then I had read somewhere that this kind of sound is very soothing to listen to, and seeing as I was a person of a passionate disposition, I thought I would see exactly what this kind of random noise could do for me to calm my nerves when I needed them to be calm.
EXACTLY WHAT IS WHITE NOISE?:
White noise is a mix of every sound and noise in the world; it contains every frequency we are capable of hearing. So what does it sound like? Well... like everything and nothing. It is the sound of wind as it rushes through trees, the sound of steady rain, the sound of a mother gently saying "shhhhh..." to her baby, the continuous sound of the seashore if you live near the sea, the sound of a waterfall, the sound you hear when you hold a seashell close to your ear (remember your mother telling you that you could hear the sound of the sea when you held a seashell close to your ear?).
IS WHITE NOISE FOUND ONLY IN NATURE?
No, it can be artificially produced in a sound studio by special electronic equipment and recorded directly to a CD or other audio medium for later listening in the home or office. Always though, white noise, however produced, is for sure a hissing, roaring, rushing, shhh, kind of sound.
ARTIFICIALLY-PRODUCED white noise is a very steady sound. It doesn't vary or waver in intensity at all.
However, when NATURE produces white noise by wind, rain, or sea, there is a random slight shift in sound level which goes on all the time (except that the rush of a waterfall tends to be a steady sound). This NATURAL white noise sound especially, with the slight variation in it, is very COMFORTING to the human ear. (Choose one of the following explanations for this comforting aspect of white noise that is in harmony with your belief system: 1 - we evolved over millions of years to become used to a constant low level of white noise in our natural environment so that sound is deeply calming and non-threatening to us / 2 - when God made the universe and put humans on the earth, His compassion gave us an appreciation of the natural and non-threatening nature of the God-given sounds of His natural world all around us, which we call today "white noise").
WHY PEOPLE MIGHT WANT SOOTHING WHITE NOISE AROUND THEM:
A background of white noise, whether made by human or nature, has a powerful effect of peace and relaxation on people. White noise, when used as a soft background noise, say, in the home, will also help drown out unwanted noises from outside to a perhaps surprising degree, but its primary use is not always to drown out the racket coming at you through your windows when all you really want is some peace and quiet. A couple of anecdotes follow:
THE COMPUTER BUSINESS AND THE MOTORWAY RAMP:
About 40 years ago, a computer software business in Wellington New Zealand all of a sudden had a problem with traffic noise when a new motorway ramp was built right by the building. Sound engineers were brought in, and quickly discounted ideas like providing added sound insulation or walling up the windows to keep the noise out, etc. Eventually, they came up with a cost-effective plan to put a soft background of constant white noise through the office public address system.
This soft sound covered the harsh distracting din of the motorway traffic and allowed the computer software developers to continue their important mental concentration in perceived peace and quiet. How So? In this particular application the white noise was indeed used as a cover up for the traffic noise outside the windows, and here is also how the special quality of white noise saved the day for the computer company:
White noise may in fact be quite loud, but it doesn't sound loud (unless one goes overboard with the volume control...), it tends to sound soft, gentle - "user-friendly", if you like. But as it was set loud enough to drown out the random traffic noise, all the software developers ended up hearing was, at first, a perceived soft and gentle sound of white noise. Then, white noise being perceived by the brain as a completely non-threatening sound from nature from the moment humans first walked the earth eons ago, that perceived "friendly" sound was "tuned out" by the brain and, so far as the software developers perceived it, they were doing their work in perfect natural quietness.
This story is true. It was written up in the Wellington daily newspapers at the time, as an innovative solution to a traffic noise problem. The company was the Sperry computer company - a major international player in those days, and their address was Greenock House, The Terrace, Wellington. I worked for the company for a while.
In my (Stan's) humble opinion, this use of noise to make silence was not magic, but the pragmatic, practical application of white noise to make a perceived quiet background for the staff and thus solve a real-world urban problem - and it happened to work! (and as I recall all these years later, the white noise - more accurately they termed it "pink"* noise - was artificially generated by electronics, but I cannot swear to that now). (* To explain simply, "pink" noise is white noise with a boosted lower register).
MOTHERS and BABIES:
It so happened years ago, in my empirical research in to white noise, I began to hear and read anecdotes from a few mothers who had found a way to solve their distress over their failures to put their babies down to sleep - and the babies in turn, becoming progressively over-tired and grumpy, would also become distressed - until those mothers began to use white noise in the nursery at sleep times. That was one reason that prompted me to make a natural white noise CD and market it to mothers.
And, so gratifying for all concerned, every single mother who reported back to me about her use of white noise, told me it helped her baby into happy, peaceful sleep without any fuss. No mother ever told me it did not work. So mothers, while I have no peer-reviewed formal scientific research to prove that white noise is great for putting babies to sleep, I surely do have some very grateful-sounding positive feedback from New Zealand mothers with healthy happy babies (email me if you want and for a small cost I will send you a CD of natural White Noise).
My WHISPERINGS OF THE PACIFIC CD:
Although long ago I had built an electronic generator of white noise and turned it on in my own city dwelling to see what would happen, eventually living with it at a low sound level for years day and night except when driving or visiting, I nevertheless wanted to use a natural source of white noise for the CDs I made years ago, figuring - for no particular reason - that Mother Nature might somehow be a better provider of it than my rock-steady artificial electronic machine.
The ONLY sound on my early Whisperings of the Pacific CDs was the natural white noise sound of the world's largest ocean, the "Peaceful Ocean" (Pacific). On a cold winter's night in July 2005 in coastal Christchurch New Zealand, I stood near Cave Rock on the beach with my portable recording equipment as dusk fell. I chose winter, and dusk, because I did not want any people, dogs or cars around to make distracting sounds on my recording. Even the seagulls were away somewhere else. Mother Nature offered up a calm night, not much wind, as the ocean quietly spoke to me. This made for a remarkably steady recorded sound in spite of the fact that waves gently breaking on the shoreline were making the sound. There are of course small variations in sound level as would be perfectly normal in natural white noise. Sometimes the lapping waves did create minor changes in volume or tone as they ebbed and flowed around Cave Rock. Nothing was added or changed about the recording; it was left exactly as first recorded at Cave Rock. and this is the very same sound that the babies in their nurseries in the above anecdote went to sleep by...
That white noise CD was 1 hour long. It's good to help grownups to get off to sleep, so I was told...
PINK NOISE / WHITE NOISE:
Everything I have written about white noise on this page, also is true for pink noise. In the audio profession, both are recognised as being a full spectrum of all sounds that there are, all mixed in together. The difference is that pink noise has a bassier sound to it, its energy decreases per octave. White noise by contrast has equal energy all the way up through the octaves.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~