Human Dimension of the Soundscape: From Individuals to Society - Soundscape Ecology: Principles, Patterns, Methods and Applications - page 134

than sound pressure level ( L eq ) or the subjectively evaluated sound level, but is the
visual comfort that has a greater influence. In conclusion, improving the acoustic
comfort increases the acceptability of a park.
Semantic differential scaling is often used to evaluate the quality of the sonic
environment, and several field studies have demonstrated that the informative
properties of sound (i.e., categories of sounds) are better predictors of the perceived
sonic quality than acoustic measures of the soundscape (i.e., L eq ).
Aesthetic landscapes and acoustic comfort are important components of overall
physical comfort in urban areas. For this reason planners and architects must
reserve to the soundscape aesthetic the same role attributed to other visual
components of the urban landscape. Modeling is required to understand the sonic
environment complexity in which perception and interpretation are both fundamen-
tal proxies to assess the sonic quality of a site.
The comfort acoustic model seems to work better than soundscape quality maps,
as observed experimentally by Yu and Kang ( 2009 ) when an artificial neural
network is utilized.
5.16 Conclusions
Noise represents, especially in urban areas, one of the major sources of citizen
dissatisfaction and for this reason policies to develop efficient control tools and
methods of assessment have to be urgently provided by policymakers. Noise
exposure affects people's well-being. The evaluation of noise depends on noise
type and on psychological and social characteristics.
The psychological perspective assumes that different people perceive differently
the sound of the environment according to status, gender, culture, attitude, etc. In
fact, according to the level of development that an area experiences, the noise is
evaluated differently. For instance, in underdeveloped areas the mechanical noise
are evaluated more negatively than in developed areas where people expect a mix of
mechanical and nonmechanical noise. The tolerance to noise intrusion is higher in
developed areas. Foreground task can change the level of perception of the noise. A
wilderness hiker can tolerate the noise produced by a rescue helicopter more than
that by a tourist airplane that is considered less necessary.
Noise requires tools to be recorded with reliability and a way to represent its
distribution in space and time, in other words, to transform point-recording data in
spatially distributed surfaces. For this the use of GIS represent the natural evolution
of sound representation.
Public and private behavior can strongly improve the sonic ambience. Planning
new buildings in quiet areas far from very noisy surroundings is a reasonable
measure. In the private domain, the maintenance of a indoor low volume of radio
and TV, and a lower voice during outdoor conversation on mobile telephones, are
some possible “micro” actions highly beneficial for a common (public) sonic
environment.