Unless I'm missing something how is standing on the pegs (and well above the screen presumably) out of the airflow? My experience with screens has been exactly the opposite; above the screen is as noisy as hell (although it needs a properly designed screen, not your cat flap held in place by duct tape).

Sorry, should've elaborated: out of the flow of turbulent air disturbed by the passage of the bits of the bike in front of you. The helmet traveling on its own through otherwise still air is, apparently, really not very turbulent at all.

(Compare riding with nobody in front of you to being stuck behind a lorry.)

I don't use tall screens, prefer to have wind on my chest and have direct view on the road. In my experience much better is to invest in very good, aerodynamic helmet. Once I got my arai tour and shoei nxr helmets they made all the difference, it was much quieter and my had stopped to jerk around on wind gusts. For longer journeys sometimes use earplugs.

Either the windscreen must be so tall that its taller than your head when youre sitting on the bike so that you can hide behind it or it must be relatively low. Those quite high windscreens that only gives shelter halfway up your head and thus gives a huge airflow straight into your head are absolutely the worst. The original screen on my Tenere 660 for example was absolutely PITA. Fitted a 10 cm taller screen and its much better.
On the Tiger 955 I had I went lower than the original and also that was waay much better than original halftall...

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In the end everything will be fine. If its not fine its not the end....

I would hardly call them a trap - I find tall windscreens rather comforting, however I do not know how much of that comfort is psychological. Having it cover my entire body provides a sense of protection and safety, even if a superficial one.

That's exactly why I called them a trap. They provide a psychological sensation of being better and more comfortable, while not actually making the ride quieter. I guess they keep more of the bugs off your jacket...

Maybe I'm being obtuse here but my (subjective) experience has been that 'naked' bikes are wind noisy as hell and more tiring to ride - at any significant speed anyway. I can't say I've ever noticed how having my whole upper body directly in the airflow has led to a quiet ride compared to having some kind of barrier in front of me. OK, on some of my DIY attempts it's needed a bit of 'development' work to cut down on edge of the screen turbulence and in one case a 'blowing across a bottle top' whistle but these were easy to do.

The bikes with factory fitted fairings I've owned have all been pretty good and I can't say I've ever thought that they were noisy. My current GoldWing (an extreme example I admit) is so quiet behind the screen I can listen to the radio through the speakers at 70mph. Swapping from that onto a KLR doesn't feel like I've entered an oasis of calm.

And as for riding any distance in winter without some sort of screen - noisy or not - this picture, taken at the side of the autobahn returning from a long ago Elephant Rally, just about says it all. Temp at the time was around -10C :

When you're following a lorry you're sitting in a pocket of moving air being dragged along by it, so naturally there is less wind noise. What makes the noise is the shearing action between moving and static air, typically as the air stream going past your helmet meets the non moving air inside it. So unless you've got a real "barn door" fairing that deflects all the airflow over your head, your helmet will be in some kind of moving air.

Personally the only advantage I find with screens is they keep some of the wind load off your upper body, avoiding the "sheet in the wind" effect at speed.

That's not what happens though. Unless you are tailgaiting extremely closely, like the hypermiling car guys, you're sitting in the vortex of extremely turbulent air created by the lorry's passing. The absolute most uncomfortable place to be on a motorcycle is behind a lorry. I'd rather ride through a hailstorm.

The reason I brought it up was that if I stand up on the pegs - putting my head significantly outside any aerodynamic business to do with the body of the bike - it gets really quiet. My helmet is still moving through air, obviously.

You don't need to be that close. In my younger days I used to tailgate lorries on motorways a lot, as I had a low powered bike. The "tail" of moving air behind a lorry extends for about a second of travel (I know that's "too close", but I was young and stupid). Once you get outside of that there is a small turbulent zone as the moving air from the lorry meets still air but pretty quickly you're back into still air. And having done many miles with no screens at all I've never experienced a situation where standing up made any difference to wind noise in the helmet. Maybe this is something to do with the airflow set up by your screen?

Lots of things can cause turbulence. On some other forums guys have got into this in a serious way.

Standing IS is indeed quieter if you have any sort of front cowl or small shield.
On a true "naked" bike, would be less, but still a difference sitting to standing. (I measured this with Audiophile pro equipment)

It's been found that even mirrors and bark busters can add to noise.
Who knew?

But, every bike is different and more importantly, every rider is physically different. They sit on the bike differently, are larger or smaller riders, some hunch forward, some sit bolt upright.

All this affects wind noise and buffeting.

And as mentioned, some helmets are better than others.

TIP: having done an actual helmet noise study for USA Motorcyclist magazine (I did sound recording and analysis) we "discovered" that most noise comes from under your chin.

We used a naked bike (1200 Bandit) same rider for all testing.

So ... a chin baffle can quiet things quite a bit ... if you can fit one in there.

In our testing (from early 1990's) Arai was quietest, Shuberth not for sale in USA at that time. Shoei a close 2nd. things dropped off quickly and dramatically after that.

I used "best in the world" lavaliere mics taped onto riders ears with wind screens. Test rider not happy upon removal!

I fit tall screens to all my bikes. And fit universal screens to any bikes that don't have them if I intend to travel on them.

Having a screen takes A LOT of the fatigue out of long distances. And saves your hearing too.

I have found that the top of the screen needs to be in-line with your chin to displace the air over your head.

Helmets with peaks don't help either. Although, I have a peak.

Try one of these.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/232870529652

But do put something between the clamp and your screen as these cheaper ones can make your screen crack.

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Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.