Sounds, particularly those made by other humans, rank as the No. 1 distraction in the workplace. According to workplace design expert Alan Hedge at Cornell, 74 percent of workers say they face “many” instances of disturbances and distractions from noise.
“In general, if it’s coming from another person, it’s much more disturbing than when it’s coming from a machine,” he says, because, as social beings, humans are attuned to man-made sounds. He says overheard conversations, as well as high-pitched and intermittent noises, also draw attention away from tasks at hand.
The popularity of open offices has exacerbated the problem. The University of California’s Center for the Built Environment has a study showing workers are happier when they are in enclosed offices and less likely to take sick days.
This does not bode well for some workers facing cold and flu season, when hacking coughs make the rounds. But some people, such as Milwaukee Web developer Taj Shahrani, contend with it year-round.
He had a colleague who sat a short cubicle wall away and would, as he says, “shout-cough” at regular intervals.
“He never covered his mouth,” he says. The violent episodes, which Shahrani and another colleague kept tallies of, would shake his desk and interrupt conversations and phone calls.
Read More – Source: Noisy Coworkers And Other Sounds Are A Distraction In Workplace : NPR