Question

What are wavelength, frequency, time period and amplitude of a sound wave?

Answer 1

Hint: In order to solve this question, we are going to first analyze a sound wave and what are the parameters for it, then the wavelength, frequency, time period and amplitude for a wave and then to specify these quantities for the sound waves also.

Complete step-by-step answer:
Wavelength: The wavelength of a sound wave is defined as the distance between the adjacent identical parts of the wave. In other words , it is the distance between two crests or two troughs.
The wavelength of the sound wave is calculated as:
\[wavelength = \dfrac{{velocity\,of\,sound}}{{frequency}}\]
The unit for the wavelength is the same as that of the length.
Frequency: The frequency of sound waves is defined as the number of waves that pass a fixed point in a second. It is measured in hertz\[\left( {Hz} \right)\]. Human beings can normally hear sounds with a frequency between about \[20Hz\]and\[20000Hz\]. Sounds with frequencies below \[20Hz\] are called infrasound.
Time period: The time period is defined as the total time taken by the wave to complete one oscillation. If an event occurs repeatedly then the event is said to be periodic. The time taken by the periodic event to repeat itself is known as the period.
Time period is given by
\[T = \dfrac{1}{{frequency}}\]
Amplitude: The amplitude of a sound wave is the measure of the height of the wave. The amplitude of a sound wave is defined as the amount of maximum displacement of vibrating particles of the medium from their mean position. It is the distance between crest or trough and the mean position of the wave.

Note: All these quantities have their values in a particular range that directly depend on the range that is predefined for the frequency of a sound wave. As Human beings can normally hear sounds with a frequency between about \[20Hz\]and\[20000Hz\], so we have wavelength, period etc. corresponding to that.