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background level

background level

1 4.6
How loud unwanted sound is in a place or recording
  • noun
  • Specialized
translation icon : nivel de ruido de fondo
  • The background level of noise in the recording made it difficult to hear the speaker's voice.
  • high background level
  • normal background level

Examples

  • To improve the clarity of the audio, they reduced the background level of static interference.

  • In the quiet library, the background level of chatter was barely noticeable.

  • Mainly because the "danger" levels for radiation are set below background levels.

    Blog text (25)
  • That gamma dose rate was about 1,000 times higher than the normal background level.

    Academic text (1999)
  • Second, there is a constant, fairly high background level of radioactivity involved.

    Fiction book (2001)
  • Technologies developed by Borexino collaborators have achieved very low background levels.

    Blog text (28)
  • Most people don't realize, because it's invisible, that the background level of tropospheric ozone is increasing.

    Blog text (32)
  • Because of the comparatively high background levels in the body, experiments using stable isotopes require more tracer units than those that use radioisotopes.

    Academic text (2011)
  • One of Foreman's main tasks on the trip was to record and compare background levels outside and inside the acoustic shielding device that protects ALFID from external noise.

    Academic text (1996)
  • To understand whether there may be differences in the background levels of parasites and predators confronting aliens that enter either European or North American forests, we compare natural enemy levels in both continents.

    Academic text (1996)

Synonyms

noise
vsbackground level
  • Specialized
172 5.6

Extra sounds or information that hide the main message

refers specifically to sound intensity rather than general interference or irrelevant data
background noise
vsbackground level
  • Specialized
11 3.5

Unwanted sounds that make it hard to hear or record something

measures how strong those unwanted sounds are rather than naming the sounds
noise level
vsbackground level
  • Specialized
5 3.1

How loud unwanted background sound is

is an interchangeable term focusing on ambient intensity

Antonyms

signal level
  • Specialized
4.2

The strength of an electrical connection for sound or data

How Strong

saturation
16 4.6
interference
  • Specialized
93 6.6
background noise
  • Specialized
11 3.5
background level
  • Specialized
1 4.6
silence
660 2.0

Surface Forms

Morphology

background + level

The phrase simply denotes the measured amount or intensity of the 'background' (noise) and is directly built from 'background' (extraneous noise) + 'level' (measured amount). This compositional, descriptive noun phrase follows standard English noun-noun/compound semantics and is cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents should be able to infer the meaning.

Etymology

Background level comes from the picture of a sound behind the main sound: the background sits at a certain level, like a quiet hum under a voice. So it means the 'amount of unwanted noise' you can hear in a place or recording.