Experiments over the last 50 years have suggested a tentative correlation between the surface (shear) viscosity and the stability of a foam or emulsion. We examine this link theoretically using small-amplitude capillary waves in the presence of a surfactant solution of dilute concentrations where the associated Marangoni and surface viscosity effects are modelled via the Boussinesq-Scriven formulation. The resulting integro-differential initial value problem is solved analytically
and surface viscosity is found to contribute an overall damping effect on the amplitude of the capillary wave with varying degrees depending on the lengthscale of the system.
Numerically, we find the critical damping wavelength to increase for increasing surface concentration but the rate of increase remains different for both the surface viscosity and the Marangoni effect.