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Smoke Alarm Studies

(Full reports in PDF format use back button to return)

1. "Comparison of a Personalized Parent Voice Smoke Alarm With a Conventional Residential Tone Smoke Alarm for Awakening Children" - Gary A. Smith, Mark Splaingard, John R. Hayes and Huiyun Xiang Pediatrics 2006;118;1623-1632 DOI: 10.1542/peds.2006-0125 (Read/print full study in PDF format)

Abstract: Conventional residential tone smoke alarms fail to awaken the majority of children during slow wave sleep. With the objective of identifying a more effective smoke alarm for children, we compared a personalized parent voice smoke alarm with a conventional residential tone smoke alarm, both presented at 100 dB, with respect to their ability to awaken children 6- to 12-years-old from stage 4 sleep and prompt their performance of a simulated self-rescue escape procedure.

2. "CPSC Report Calls for More Research on Deficiencies in Smoke Alarm Audibility" - US Consumer Product Safety Commission, January 12, 2005. (Read/print full report in PDF format)

Abstract: Current models of smoke detectors do not reliably awaken children under 16 years of age or senior citizens who are hard of hearing, according to a U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission Report released January 11, 2005 and recommended conducting more research.

3. "The Effectiveness of Different Alarms in Waking Sleeping Children" - Dorothy Bruck, Shannie Reid, et al. School of Psychology, Victoria University, Melborne, Australia (2004) 12 pages (Read/print full study in PDF format)

Abstract: Residential fire is a major cause of fire fatalities and smoke alarms are installed to promptly detect and warn people of fires so that action can be taken. Reports of 114 fire fatalities in Australia noted that 81% of the fires were at night and in those, 86% of the people were sleeping. It is thus important that smoke alarms be as effective as possible. A review of the research on who will wake up to smoke alarms and under what circumstances showed that there were many potentially vulnerable groups in the population, including children, the elderly, people under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and people who are sleep deprived. While standard smoke alarms reliably awake unimpaired adults only 6% of children (age 6-15) awoke reliably to these standard alarms.