Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Decibel |
DecibelNoun1. A logarithmic unit of sound intensity; 10 times the logarithm of the ratio of the sound intensity to some reference intensity. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "decibel" was first used: 1928 coinage. (references) |
| Domain | Definitions |
Aerospace | 1. A dimensionless measure of the ratio of two powers, equal to 10 times the logarithm to the base 10 of the ratio of two powers P1/P2. 2. One-tenth of a bel.The power P2 may be some reference power; in electricity, the reference power is sometimes taken as 1 milliwatt (Abbreviation dbm); in acoustics, the decibel is often taken as 20 times the common logarithm of the sound pressure ratio, with the reference pressure as 0.0002 dyne per square centimeter.Abbreviation db. (references) |
Electrical Engineering | A transmission unit giving the ratio of two powers; the decibel is equal to one-tenth of a bel. Source: European Union. (references) |
Mining | The unit for measuring sound intensity. (references) |
Public Administration | The unit for measuring the intensity of sound on a logarithmic scale. Source: European Union. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Synonym: DecibelSynonym: dB (n). (additional references) |
Crosswords: Decibel |
| Specialty definitions using "decibel": adjusted decibel, automobile inspector ♦ decibel per second ♦ INSPECTOR, MOTOR VEHICLES ♦ motor-transport inspector ♦ percentage of deafness, percentage of hearing impairment, percentage of hearing loss ♦ rate of decay ♦ SAFETY INSPECTOR, safety technician ♦ weigh-station inspector. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Decibel" is also a word in the following languages with English translations in parentheses. Czech (decibel), Hungarian (decibel), Italian (decibel), Portuguese (decibel), Romanian (decibel), Serbo-Croatian (decibel), Spanish (decibel), Swedish (decibel). |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Cirrus, Socrates, particle, decibel, hurricane, dolphin, tulip. (Artificial Intelligence: AI; writing credit: Ian Watson) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | A decibel level of 30 is half as loud as a normal conversation. (references) | |
A doctor can determine whether a person has experienced SSHL by conducting a normal hearing test. If a loss of at least 30 decibels in three connected frequencies is discovered, it is diagnosed as SSHL. A decibel is a measure of sound. (references) | ||
Sounds louder than 85 decibels (dB) can damage your ears. A decibel is a unit that measures the intensity of sound on a scale from zero to 140. A normal conversation is about 60 dB. Chainsaws, hammer drills, and bulldozers ring in at over 100 dB. So if you are a construction worker, harmful sounds may be a regular part of your job. The same goes for people working around lawn mowers and factory machinery every day. Airport workers and farmers are two more groups that are regularly exposed to loud noise. (references) | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Decibel" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 72.50% of the time. "Decibel" is used about 40 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 72.5% | 29 | 64,444 |
| Noun (proper) | 20% | 8 | 124,375 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 7.5% | 3 | 202,518 |
| Total | 100.00% | 40 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expression using "decibel": adjusted decibel. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "decibel": decibel-diplomacy, decibel-heavy. | |
Ending with "decibel": high-decibel, higher-decibel, low-decibel. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
decibel | 192 |
decibel meter | 52 |
decibel product | 37 |
decibel level | 25 |
decibel scale | 23 |
antenna decibel | 18 |
decibel definition | 11 |
chart decibel | 10 |
decibel rating | 8 |
clothing decibel | 6 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "decibel"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Arabic | ديسيبل وحدة قياس. (various references) | |
Chinese | 分贝耳. (various references) | |
Czech | decibel. (various references) | |
Danish | decibel, db,dB, dB (gross margin). (various references) | |
Dutch | decibel, dB. (various references) | |
Farsi | واحدی برای اندازه گیری شدت وضعف صدا, واحدنسبت بین دومقدارالکتریسیته . (various references) | |
Finnish | desibeli. (various references) | |
French | décibel. (various references) | |
German | dezibel (D.B.). (various references) | |
Greek | Decibel, ντεσιμπέλ, μπελ, ηχόμετρο. (various references) | |
Hungarian | decibel. (various references) | |
Italian | decibel. (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | デオキシリボ 酸 (10^-1, carving, crepe de Chine, cutting up, decadence, decadent, decadentism, decanter, deci-, decimal, decimal point, decision, decision making, decision room, declamation, decode, decoder, decoding, decompiler, decorated cake, decoration, decoy, decrement, decrescendo, degree, deodorant, deoxyribo, deoxyribo nucleic acid, desert, design, design policy, design promoter, designer, designer brand, design-in, desire, dessert, dessert wine, digital, digital analog, digital art, digital audio tape recorder, digital computer, digital speedometer, digital television, Dixie, Dixieland, Dixieland jazz, fancy cake, low status, low-cut, transfer). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | デシベル . (various references) | |
Korean | 데시벨. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | ecibelday.(various references) | |
Portuguese | decibel. (various references) | |
Romanian | decibel. (various references) | |
Russian | децибел. (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | decibel. (various references) | |
Spanish | decibel. (various references) | |
Swedish | decibel. (various references) | |
Turkish | desibel, güç ve ses şiddet birimi. (various references) | |
Ukranian | децибел. (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | decibus. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "decibel": decibels. (additional references) | |
| |
"Decibel" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Deccie, decibal, decibell, decible, Delibe, delible, desserbil, Deziel, dicibel, Dycetel, Neibel. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "decibel" (pronounced de"sube'l) |
| 3 | -b e' l | barbell, cowbell, doorbell, dumbbell. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "b-c-d-e-e-i-l" | |
-1 letter: belied, ceiled, decile, edible. | |
-2 letters: bedel, belie, bield, bleed, cebid, celeb, deice, edile, elide. | |
-3 letters: bice, bide, bile, bled, cede, cedi, ceil, deil, dele, deli, dice, diel, eide, iced, idle, lice, lied. | |
-4 letters: bed, bee, bel, bid, cee, cel, deb, dee, del, dib, die, eel, eld, ice, led, lee, lei, lib, lid, lie. | |
-5 letters: be, bi, de, ed, el, id, li. | |
| Words containing the letters "b-c-d-e-e-i-l" | |
+1 letter: credible, decibels, educible. | |
+2 letters: decidable, deducible, medicable, reducible. | |
+3 letters: ascendible, creditable, deceivable, declinable, deductible, despicable, eradicable, excludible, incredible, ineducable, predicable. | |
+4 letters: becudgeling, binucleated, condensible, deductibles, depreciable, descendible, describable, discernable, discernible, immedicable, irreducible, medicinable, pitchblende, predicables, predictable, sublicensed, undecidable. | |
+5 letters: accreditable, becudgelling, cloudberries, considerable, decipherable, destructible, discoverable, displaceable, indeclinable, indefectible, indefectibly, ineradicable, pitchblendes, recalibrated, relubricated, reproducible. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)44 65 63 69 62 65 6C |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references)-.. . -.-. .. -... . .-.. |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01000100 01100101 01100011 01101001 01100010 01100101 01101100 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)D e c i b e l |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0044 0065 0063 0069 0062 0065 006C |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)38716975687178 |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Quotations: Non-fiction 6. Usage Frequency 7. Expressions 8. Expressions: Internet | 9. Translations: Modern 10. Translations: Ancient 11. Derivations 12. Rhymes | 13. Anagrams 14. Orthography 15. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
