Playback in noisy environments is shrinking audio dynamic range.

Evidence

Today, in much of the music, movies and television we are exposed to, dynamic range is diminishing. Some of it is that programs are tailored for where we listen—cars, earphones on the street, in buses, the subway, etc. where background noises abound. — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 994

Categorization

• XREF: Relates to loudness-war discussions and the reader’s psychoacoustic interest in masking by background noise — dynamic compression as a response to masking in real listening environments.