1. Effect on general health:
Noise pollution increases the rate of heart beat, constriction of blood vessels and blood pressure. Noise also causes anxiety, stress and headache. Defective sight and color vision may also result from noise pollution. Noise causes emotional disturbance and disturbs sleeps. Noise can also impair the development of nervous system of unborn babies which leads to abnormal behavior in later life.
2. Noise induced hearing loss:
Exposure to sufficiently intense noise for a long enough duration results in damage to the inner ear and thus decrease one's ability to hear. In addition to a general decreased in the ability to detect sounds, the quality and clarity of auditory perception can be affected, as well. Continued exposure to noise damages hearing. The louder the noise levels at above 85 dB can cause deafness.
3. Annoyance:
One of the important effects of noise on humans is annoyance. A noise can be said to be annoying if an exposed individual or a group of individuals would reduce the noise, avoid, or leave the noisy area if possible.
4. Effects of noise on animals:
Damage to heart, brain, liver, endocrine glands and embryo has been reported in animals due to prolonged noise pollution.
5. Communication interference:
Noise pollution can have a considerable effect on communication. Noise can mask speech and even when speech is accurately understood, background noise may result in greater effort on the part of the speaker and listener than otherwise would be needed.
6. Other effects:
There are many other effects of noise other than those discussed so far, and some of these innumerable effects involve cognitive performance, occupational performance, psychological functioning and effects on aggression.