acoustics

/əˈkustɪks/

If you choose to study sound, your field of expertise would be called acoustics. Once you get your degree, you might be hired by concert halls to improve the acoustics, or how sound carries through the room.

Changing the acoustics of a room can be as simple as adding carpeting or curtains, as materials absorb sound waves. When you go to a fancy restaurant, look around. You might see decorative fabric panels on the walls. These acoustic panels don't just make the room look good, they make it so that you can hear your neighbor, but not the fellow across the room.

Definitions of acoustics

1. noun

   the study of the physical properties of sound
   synonyms: phonics

   types:

   harmonics

   the study of musical sound

   phonetics

   the branch of acoustics concerned with speech processes including its production and perception and acoustic analysis

   type of:

   physical science, physics

   the physical properties, phenomena, and laws of something
2. noun

   the characteristics or qualities that determine how sound is heard in an enclosed space
   type of:

   sound property

   an attribute of sound