Page 37 - April 2008

NOISE AS AN INDICATOR OF QUALITY OF LIFE: ADVANCES IN MEASUREMENT OF NOISE AND NOISE EFFECTS ON HUMANS AND ANIMALS IN THE ENVIRONMENT
Ann Bowles
Hubbs-SeaWorld Research Institute San Diego, California 92109
and
Brigitte Schulte-Fortkamp
TU-Berlin, Institute of Fluid Mechanics and Engineering Acoustics Berlin, Germany
Ajointly-sponsored session on
“Advances in Measurement of
Noise and Noise Effects on
Humans and Animals in the
Environment” took place for the first
time at the meeting of the Acoustical
Society of America in New Orleans
(November 2007). It was organized by
Ann Bowles representing Animal
Bioacoustics and Brigitte Schulte-
Fortkamp representing Noise. Recent
studies on both humans and animals
were presented in two half-day ses-
sions, followed by panel discussions
on selecting efficient metrics with
which to discuss notions of soundscape versus acoustic topology versus acoustic environment, and “meta-acoustic” influences on response to noise. The outcome of the session is summarized in this article in “snap-shot” form, with a short overview of the papers presented, proposed concepts, and main topics discussed during the panels. The corre- sponding abstracts can be found in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, Volume 122, Number 5, Part 2, November 2007, 154th Meeting: Acoustical Society of America, p. 9-11 and 33-35.
The purpose of the session was to bring together work from the Noise and Animal Bioacoustics Technical Committees reflecting the development of methodologies as
“Results of a special session on recent advances in the study of noise and noise effects on humans and animals to foster the dialog about methodologies and theoretical principles common to both.”
well as new research in both fields. The organizers were most interested in highlighting commonalities between human and non-human animal studies (common problems, theories, and solu- tions). The invited and contributed presentations focused on models, pre- diction, and measurements taken from both field and laboratory studies.
Brigitte Schulte-Fortkamp present- ed an overview paper on evaluation of effects of environmental noise on humans. She introduced a different approach for making measurements in defined environments, pointing out the
need for qualitative approaches that are appropriate to explain human reactions to noise brought about by factors other than physical acoustic characteristics. This approach is
1,2
understanding of both animal behavior and human cogni- tion. She showed that contemporary cognitive models of information processing that purport to be universal cannot account for the ways that “ordinary” humans perceive and react to environmental noise in the complex “real” world. In everyday life, humans process multimodal incoming stimula- tions in a holistic manner. For example, humans reconceive noise as meaningful events, relating soundscape to human
central to soundscape research.
Danielle Dubois discussed how semantics may help
Fig. 1. Soundwalk.
Noise as an Indicator of Quality of Life 35