decibel

«decibel» in Mova's school dictionary: a unit for measuring how loud a sound is — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

part of speech

noun (a decibel, decibels — written dB)

meaning for a pupil

(science) A decibel is a unit for measuring how loud a sound is. tree →

sense in the lessons

In science, sounds are measured in decibels: whispering is about 30 dB, normal talk about 60 dB, a busy road about 80 dB, a rock concert over 100 dB. Long exposure above about 85 dB can damage hearing — wear ear protection and keep headphones at safe volume.

examples

• A whisper is about 30 decibels. tree →
• The concert reached 110 decibels. tree →
• Sounds above 85 decibels can harm your hearing over time. tree →
• We measured the playground noise in decibels with an app. tree →
• The teacher's whistle was very high in decibels. tree →
• Lower the volume on your headphones to keep the decibels down. tree →

note

Short form: dB. Maths trap: the decibel scale is not like a ruler — adding 10 dB means about ten times more sound energy and sounds roughly twice as loud, so 80 dB is much more than «a bit» louder than 70 dB.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «decibel» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.