I've taken to wearing earplugs. Not earbuds, earplugs. Over that I sometimes wear firing range headphones. I had to do this since the woman next to me was going through a horrible, horrible divorce and would talk to her mother during the work day (don't blame her, I'd do the same maybe if my wife tried to burn the house with me and the kids in it).
I have noticed though that this is particularly bad for team dynamics. Everyone on the team is use to me having earplugs in, but they still feel like they can't ask me questions. As the lead, I need to be open to questions. As a result, I sometimes wear them; sometimes I don't. I do know that it would be far more efficient to have walls.
I did the same thing and, to my befuddlement, found that it did not suffice (even with "33 db" earplugs). A few moments' reflection gave men the answer: both earplugs and firing range headphones are designed to block noise from frequencies _outside_ the range of the human voice and to _allow_ the human voice to come piercing through. This is done for safety concerns as well as for enabling communication in noisy environments.
I now seek earplugs/earphones designed to specifically block the human voice.
The isolation/frequency curve is one factor, certainly, but a bigger problem is that the ear's response is logarithmic. Even if the earplugs or earmuffs have a perfectly flat isolation/frequency curve, so that all frequencies are attenuated by 33 dB, you can still hear just fine; it's just not as loud. Only if you introduce some masking sound (even white or pink noise will do) in combination with the attenuation can you render the outside sounds inaudible.
I noticed the same thing, especially when I just had the firing range headphones. However whenever paired, or even alone did help some. It turned the noise around me into more of Peanut's teacher sound (wawawaan).
Earbuds and white noise does seem to help. I've found that binaural beats help block the noise and increase my focus.
"... I have noticed though that this is particularly bad for team dynamics. Everyone on the team is use to me having earplugs in, but they still feel like they can't ask me questions. As the lead, I need to be open to questions. ..."
I have noticed though that this is particularly bad for team dynamics. Everyone on the team is use to me having earplugs in, but they still feel like they can't ask me questions. As the lead, I need to be open to questions. As a result, I sometimes wear them; sometimes I don't. I do know that it would be far more efficient to have walls.