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Machine learning approaches for pattern recognition are increasingly popular. However, the underlying algorithms are often not open source, may require substantial data for model training, and are not geared toward specific tasks. We used open-source software to build a green toad breeding call detection algorithm that will aid in field data analysis. We provide instructions on how to reproduce our approach for other animal sounds and research questions. Our approach using 34 green toad call sequences and 166 audio files without green toad sounds had an accuracy of 0.99 when split into training (70%) and testing (30%) datasets. The final algorithm was applied to amphibian sounds newly collected by citizen scientists. Our function used three categories: “Green toad(s) detected”, “No green toad(s) detected”, and “Double check”. Ninety percent of files containing green toad calls were classified as “Green toad(s) detected”, and the remaining 10% as “Double check”. Eighty-nine percent of files not containing green toad calls were classified as “No green toad(s) detected”, and the remaining 11% as “Double check”. Hence, none of the files were classified in the wrong category. We conclude that it is feasible for researchers to build their own efficient pattern recognition algorithm.

Urban natural parks represent a remarkable concept that evokes the coexistence of human habitation with a wild environment, and the associated interactions between human and natural territories. In this context, urban noise infringes upon the natural soundscape, leading to various consequences for both realms. This study seeks to characterize the impact of anthropic noise levels on biodiversity in the urban natural Văcărești Park (Bucharest, Romania), utilizing on-site measurements and software simulation techniques. The study seeks to develop a method for evaluating integrative strategies to mitigate the impact of traffic noise on wildlife in an urban wild park, without addressing the specific effects of noise on the perception and communication of individual species. By calibrating field measurements with laboratory results, a more reliable data set will be used to identify areas where the biophonic environment is impacted by anthropogenic noise. Since human-generated noise in an urban natural park predominantly originates from road traffic and industrial sites, managing traffic noise and its propagation pathways could substantially improve the park’s soundscape. Additionally, this study will apply software simulations for noise reduction strategies, such as vegetation planting and earthen embankments, to obtain suitable solutions and propose plausible and effective actions to authorities for improving the biophonic environment. This research could also serve as the basis for long-term monitoring, allowing for the assessment of the evolution and impact of implemented measures over time.

The soundscape is a complex arrangement of sounds originating from animals and the environment. It is considered a reliable proxy for ecosystem niche structure at the community level. Acoustic communities of anuran species include advertising males, which compete in acoustic space for conspecific females. Stochastic niche theory predicts that all local niches are occupied, and the acoustic community is species-saturated. Acoustic niches, which include the spectral and temporal call structure and diel and seasonal patterns of call activity, are of similar breadth with small overlap. We tested these predictions in four communities inhabiting pristine wetlands at 2546–3188 m a.s.l. in the Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda. We sampled 74 days of hourly 5 min recordings of the local soundscape (September 2019–March 2020) using passive automated monitoring devices (Songmeter SM4). We identified species based on the advertisement call features and measured call activity as calls per minute. The communities included 4–6, species depending on wetland structure, with a shared stock of three species (Hyperolius castaneus, H. glandicolor, Leptopelis kivuensis). Independent of elevation, niche breadth for call features was similar among species and overlap reduced by partitioning the frequency range used. The diel and seasonal niche breadth of specific call activity varied according to the local temperature regime at different altitudes representing the variable part of the acoustic niche. We conclude that communities are indeed species-saturated and acoustic niches differ primarily by the fixed call features remaining locally adaptable by the modulation of the call activity pattern, corroborating the predictions of the stochastic niche theory.

Eco-acoustic indices allow us to rapidly evaluate habitats and ecosystems and derive information about anthropophonic impacts. However, it is proven that indices’ values and trends are not comparable between studies. These incongruences may be caused by the availability on the market of recorders with different characteristics and costs. Thus, there is a need to reduce these biases and incongruences to ensure an accurate analysis and comparison between soundscape ecology studies and habitat assessments. In this study, we propose and validate an audio recording equalization protocol to reduce eco-acoustic indices’ biases, by testing three soundscape recorder models: Song Meter Micro, Soundscape Explorer Terrestrial and Audiomoth. The equalization process aligns the signal amplitude and frequency response of the soundscape recorders to those of a type 1 level meter. The adjustment was made in MATLAB R2023a using a filter curve generated comparing a reference signal (white noise); the measurements were performed in an anechoic chamber using 11 audio sensors and a type 1 sound level meter (able to produce a .WAV file). The statistical validation of the procedure was performed on recordings obtained in an urban and Regional Park (Italy) assessing a significant reduction in indices’ biases on the Song Meter Micro and Audiomoth.

Amidst rapid societal changes and increasing urbanization, human connectivity with nature has declined, exacerbating public health concerns. This study assesses the efficacy of Shinrin-yoku, or ‘forest bathing’, in Wuyishan National Park as a simple and effective method to counteract the adverse health effects of contemporary lifestyles. Employing repeated-measures analysis of variance, forty-one participants were observed over three days across eight distinct forest settings. Techniques included eye-tracking for visual attention and soundscape perception assessments via questionnaires. Physiological responses were gauged through heart rate variability and skin conductance, while psychological evaluations utilized the Profile of Mood States (POMS) and Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS). Findings revealed that (1) natural soundscapes—especially birdsong, flowing water, wind, and bamboo raft sounds—and visual elements, such as distant mountains, streams, trees, Danxia landforms, tea gardens, and bamboo views, play pivotal roles in regulating heart rate variability, reducing arousal, and enhancing stress adaptation. Additionally, cultural landscapes, such as classical music and ancient structures, bolster parasympathetic activity. (2) Natural and cultural auditory stimuli, including flowing water and classical music, coupled with visual features, such as Danxia landforms, streams, distant mountains, lawns, and guide signs, effectively induce positive mood states, regulate mood disturbances, and enhance psychological well-being across diverse forest settings. These findings underscore the significant health benefits of immersive natural experiences and advocate for integrating forest-based wellness programs into public health strategies, offering compelling evidence for enriching life quality through nature engagement.

There is an increasing interest in accurately evaluating urban soundscapes to reflect citizens’ subjective perceptions of acoustic comfort. Various indices have been proposed in the literature to achieve this purpose. However, many of these methods necessitate specialized equipment or extensive data collection. This study introduces an enhanced predictor for dwelling acoustic comfort, utilizing cost-effective data consisting of a 30-s audio clip and location information. The proposed predictor incorporates two rating systems: a binary evaluation and an acoustic comfort index called ACI. The training and evaluation data are obtained from the “Sons al Balcó” citizen science project. To characterize the sound events, gammatone cepstral coefficients are used for automatic sound event detection with a convolutional neural network. To enhance the predictor’s performance, this study proposes incorporating objective noise levels from public IoT-based wireless acoustic sensor networks, particularly in densely populated areas like Barcelona. The results indicate that adding noise levels from a public network successfully enhances the accuracy of the acoustic comfort prediction for both rating systems, reaching up to 85% accuracy.

As a carrier of cultural characteristics of historic districts, the soundscape has unique advantages in shaping regional cultural personality, and mastering its spatiotemporal characteristics is crucial for preserving soundscape heritage with natural and humanistic environments as its kernel. Focusing on the Three Square and Seven Alleys historic and cultural district in Fuzhou, this paper analyzes the spatial and temporal patterns of the physical acoustic indicators of the soundscape, the spatial dependence of the sound source harmony, and the spatial relationship between the two. It was found that the physical acoustic indicators showed dynamic changes in spatial and temporal scales and reflect specific human activity and behavioral patterns; sound source harmony showed spatial autocorrelation in both global and local models, with prominent spatial characteristics; and the physical acoustic indicators may negatively affect soundscape perception. The study emphasizes the importance of the regional cultural connotation of soundscape in urban planning. It provides a scientific basis for the planning, designing, and managing of soundscape resources in historic and cultural districts and world heritage sites.

This paper proposes the ‘soundsit’ as an alternative method to be used independently or in conjunction with current soundwalking methodological practice. The soundsit seeks to address the limits of the soundwalking method in relation to issues of transition, changing context, event occurrence, temporality, and inclusivity. Soundwalking and soundsitting are both methods of experiencing soundscape: soundwalking involves exploring and listening to the sounds of the environment while moving through it, while soundsitting involves sitting still in a particular place and listening to the sounds that exist in situ. The soundsit provides the participant or researcher with a fixed perspective and place to observe and experience sounds, within a defined soundscape context, enabling them to gain a longer-term experiential understanding of a space. Analogous with acoustic measurements, soundsitting is comparable to capturing average energy equivalent sound level LAeq measurements in allowing the perception of and activities within a soundscape to settle into a steady state. Beyond obtaining a longer-term impression of a chosen sound environment, soundsitting allows for a participant to disengage with the visual, which allows for deeper engagement and focus when listening to a soundscape; in addition, soundsitting removes the safety implications and distractions of walking practice and, as such, is a more inclusive form of activity, allowing those who are unable to walk to engage in the practice. The static nature of the listening experience allows for a different type of immersion through engaged active listening, something which is not possible on a soundwalk, allowing for deeper qualitative analysis and insight into the soundscape of a specific space or location. The primary findings show with test group of n = 6 that both methods are effective soundscape study tools, and further work with diverse groups is required.

The behavioural, physiological, and energetic repercussions for wildlife that result from changes in their soundscapes are increasingly being realized. To understand the effects of changing acoustic landscapes, we first must establish the importance of the acoustic sense for species to transfer information between the environment, con- and heterospecifics, and a receiver, and the functional role of calling in behaviours such as foraging, navigation, mate attraction, and weaning. This review begins with a discussion of the use of calling and the acquisition of the vocal repertoire, before providing examples from multiple taxa on the functional applications of signals and communication. The acoustic sensory mode adds to, if not being inherent in, many critical life history stages over a range of species. The potential effects on an animal resulting from a change in its perceived soundscape and disturbance on its acoustics use is outlined. This can then be used to consider the implications of an altered acoustic niche or active space in the success and survival of an individual or species. Furthermore, we discuss briefly metrics that could be used to understand the implications of these changes, or could be used to guide mitigation action to lessen the impact.

Rapid technological advances in recent decades have led researchers to refine the accuracy of their studies. In the field of acoustics, the impact of new devices is noticeable, especially in the investigations of cultural heritage buildings. The selection of a seat in theatres and concert halls has always been a concern, since the live experience of artistic performance depends on the quality of hearing and sight view. This paper deals with the elaboration of 360° acoustic maps made in the National Theatre of Zagreb, one of the opera theatres investigated with the Sipario project. The analysis of the main acoustic parameters has been carried out, starting with site measurements describing the acoustic response at various representative points of the main hall by covering the audience area. In addition, acoustic maps have been created for some selected positions based on a 3-degree-of-freedom (3dof) technique that allows a panoramic visualization of the impulse responses (IRs). This methodology completes the determination of early and late reflections that contribute to the acoustic quality of a place. In addition to the interest of experts in acoustics, this methodology can also be adopted by music lovers who can find a reasonable explanation for seat selection when booking their tickets.

This research introduces an experimental framework based on 3D acoustic and psycho-acoustic sensors supplemented with ambisonics and sound morphological analysis, whose objective is to study urban soundscapes. A questionnaire that highlights the differences between what has been measured and what has been perceiveSd by humans complements the quantitative approach with a qualitative evaluation. The comparison of the measurements with the questionnaire provides a global vision of the perception of these soundscapes, as well as differences and similarities. The approach is experimented within the historical center of the Tunisian city of Sidi Bou Saïd, demonstrating that from a range of complementary protocols, a soundscape environment can be qualified. This framework provides an additional dimension to urban planning studies.

A soundscape carries the culture and memories of historical and cultural areas, capable of evoking people’s emotions towards a place. This paper aims to explore the influence of the soundscape on the sense of place in historical and cultural areas using a mixed-method approach. Conducting on-site measurements, questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews in four areas in Taiyuan, China, this research utilized structural equation modeling and grounded theory for analysis. Research findings: Firstly, the soundwalk method identified 11 categories of soundscapes and the main sources of noise in residential areas were traffic sounds and commercial sounds. Secondly, residents showed the highest preference for natural sounds and traditional activity sounds. Preferences for activities’ sounds and traditional sounds, along with the perceived frequency of daily life sounds, entertainment activities’ sounds, and natural sounds were positively associated with the sense of place, while the perceived frequency of commercial sounds, traffic sounds, and pet sounds was negatively associated. Lastly, from the grounded theory, this research showed that traditional sounds effectively enhanced residents’ sense of place by triggering memories, embodying culture, and connecting emotions. Daily life sounds linked residents’ lives and prompted visions, while local dialects evoked emotion and culture. Activities’ sounds served as lubricants for the place, primarily triggering residents’ sense of place from a lifestyle and emotional connection.

The mobility and activity restrictions imposed in Spain due to the COVID-19 pandemic caused a significant improvement in the urban noise pollution that could be objectively measured in those cities with acoustic sensor networks deployed. This significant change in the urban soundscapes was also perceived by citizens who positively appraised this new acoustic scenario. In this work, authors present a comparative analysis between different noise indices provided by 70 sound sensors deployed in Barcelona, both during and before the lockdown, and the results of a perceptual test conducted in the framework of the project Sons al Balcó during the lockdown, which received more than one hundred contributions in Barcelona alone. The analysis has been performed by clustering the objective and subjective data according to the predominant noise sources in the location of the sensors and differentiating road traffic in heavy, moderate and low-traffic areas. The study brings out strong alignments between a decline in noise indices, acoustic satisfaction improvement and changes in the predominant noise sources, supporting the idea that objective calibrated data can be useful to make a qualitative approximation to the subjective perception of urban soundscapes when further information is not available.

A soundscape can enhance the acoustic environment of urban areas and support the sustainable development of green spaces. This study is based on field research on plant information and a perception questionnaire conducted in 30 urban park sample sites in China. The study analysed the differences in soundscape perception among different plant spaces using three dimensions: sound source dominance degree (SDD), sound source harmony degree (SHD), and soundscape perception evaluation. Additionally, five physical indicators of plant space were selected to quantify the effects of physical characteristics of plant space on soundscape perception in urban green space (UGS). The results indicated that there were impacts on soundscape perception. The evaluation of soundscape perception between different types of plant spaces revealed notable differences, particularly in open and enclosed spaces. All eight indicators demonstrated significant differences, indicating that soundscape perception was influenced by the type of plant space. Additionally, there was a significant correlation between plant space and soundscape perception. The evaluation of soundscape perception in three dimensions was related to several factors, including the degree of spatial enclosure, crown density, average tree height, the proportion of trees and shrubs, and the number of tree species. The dominant factor affecting sound source dominance was found to be the degree of spatial enclosure, followed by the average height of trees. Additionally, the diversity of trees affected the overall soundscape perception.

Elaborate sound design, including background music, ambient sounds (sounds describing the game world), and character sounds (sounds generated by the character’s actions), plays a pivotal role in modern video games. However, the influence of these different types of sound on the player’s experience has not been extensively researched. This study examines the influence of these sound types on immersion, avatar identification, fun, and perceived competence. In two experiments, participants played League of Legends under four different sound conditions. The first experiment (N1 = 32) revealed a non-significant trend in the effect of character sounds on avatar identification. Ambient sounds, however, were limited because the task restricted participants’ movement across the game map. Consequently, we adapted the task to allow for a wider variety of ambient sounds in the second experiment (N2 = 32). Here, a significant impact of character sounds on immersion, avatar identification, and fun was observed, as well as an interaction effect of character sounds and ambient sounds on fun. Furthermore, we observed a trend, though not statistically significant, suggesting that ambient sounds may influence the player’s sense of flow. These findings underline the distinct effects of different sound types, and we discuss implications for the design of sound in video games.

While numerous dog behavioral studies use environmental sounds, the dog soundscape remains undescribed. We proposed a list of 79 sounds classified into six categories: Dog, Dog accessories, Human, city and vehicles, Garden, countryside and weather, and Household. In a survey, 620 dog owners scored the frequency of their dog’s exposure to, and thus, the recurrence of, each of the 79 sounds, from never to daily. The survey results also extended to about 25 sounds the number of acknowledged sounds that are likely to elicit stress or fear, that is, negative emotional sensitivity, in dogs. Sound recurrence and emotional sensitivity were not correlated, showing no beneficial effect of frequent exposure to, and no deleterious effect of scarcity of, sound events. We suggest that for the sake of dog welfare, researchers, veterinarians, trainers, and owners may limit dogs’ exposure to the sensitive sounds identified in the study during their dog observations and dog–human interactions. A corpus of 84 sounds was collected. The sounds were spectrally analyzed by determining their F0 and 10 dB bandwidth parameters. At the lowest sound frequencies, where canine hearing is poorest, negative emotional sensitivity was generally low. At the middle and high sound center frequencies/F0s, sensitivity greatly varied from lowest to highest, which is incompatible with both the general assumption and dog auditory detection thresholds. How emotional sensitivity relates to F0 (pitch) and hearing sensitivity remains undetermined. Finally, we suggest that future behavioral audiometric studies of dogs may maximize the spectral spread of each sound while minimizing the spectral overlap between sounds so as to reduce both the testing duration and the risk of inadvertently targeting or, conversely, missing frequency-dependent hearing impairments.

This research addresses the neglect of sensory features, specifically the soundscape, in studies focused on preserving historic areas. The aim was to contribute to soundscape research by examining the effect of sound on the perception of urban historical places and the impact of the “renewal and transformation” process on audio-visual experiences. This study focused on the historical Erbil Citadel as a case study area, known for its extensive cultural history. Sound sources in the region were identified, recorded, and analyzed using software to calculate the Sound Pressure Level (SPL). The sound sources assessed as a result of the analysis were examined using Schafer’s sound characteristics. In this study, data was collected through a soundwalk study in the historical Erbil Citadel, and its surroundings were identified. The characteristics of the sounds were determined from the sound recordings, enabling the distinction of sounds contributing to the city’s identity. A route was established in its current state, and it was identified which regional precautions should be taken to preserve the sound identity of the city.

Water’s role in shaping human societies, economies, and cultures extends beyond its status as a natural resource. This water quality, the entanglement of the social and natural, constructs the waterscape. This paper discusses how a community fountain and its replica, in a rural community of Greece, constructed by different agents with divergent motivations and objective, form a waterscape, expressing the socionature of water. Perceptions, imaginaries, values, and connotations are considered in the making and (dis)continuity of the waterscape. Community practices, social and cultural meanings, economy, commodification, collective work, privatisation, memory, and nostalgia are schemes that flow within the waterscape, over time. Flows and uses, livability, and emotions display diverse patterns of sense of rootedness on the community space.

Today, the art of knowing how to listen is more urgent than ever. The perceptive sound system of the human being is stimulated daily by countless artificial sounds that dominate natural ones. When it comes to the idea of the soundscape, the terminology was initially referred to by composer and environmentalist Raymond Murray Shafer, who defined “soundscape” as a relationship between the ear, humans, built environments, and society. This paper aims to apply the sound landscape approach in the seaport area of Ancona (Italy); a large area, frequented daily by many people, which is divided into passenger and ferry terminals, container terminals, plants for solid bulk, and commercial and recreational activities. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the perception that a human has of the urban layout of the port area by correlating the parameters of traditional acoustics with psychoacoustics. To evaluate the subjective parameters, a questionnaire was developed and applied, enabling the analysis of demographic and behavioral factors such as age, visit frequency, and length of stay of the participants in the clusters of the seaport. This way, it was possible to give an indication of the sound quality of the different clusters of the port area, from an acoustic and emotional point of view, and this information could be particularly helpful in the planning phase of new attractions for the Ancona seaport.

The lockdown in Spain due to COVID-19 caused a strong decrease in the urban noise levels observed in most cities, clearly followed in the case that these cities had acoustic sensor networks deployed. This fact had an impact on people’s lives, who, at that time, were mainly locked at home due to health reasons. In this paper, we present a qualitative analysis of the subjective vision of the citizens participating in a data-collecting campaign during the COVID-19 lockdown in Girona, a Catalan city, named ‘Sons al Balcó’. The alignment of the subjective data gathered was too scarce to conduct final conclusions, but already giving a bias of the results indicates that the objective LAeq measurements, which showed a clear decrease in noise in the streets during the lockdown, were supported by the fact that new sounds found during the lockdown were not very annoying. Former existing noise sources, such as road traffic noise or leisure noise, are depicted as annoying but their decrease during the lockdown improved the soundscape of many homes. This paper’s goal is to show the possibility of gathering both objective and calibrated data with perceptive approximation for the first time in ‘Sons al Balcó’, and how this supports our conclusions, in survey with a limited number of participants conducted during the 2020 lockdown period in Catalonia.

Creating attractive urban green spaces in severely cold and harsh climates is significant for promoting peoples’ health and perceived restoration. However, there is little evidence regarding the urban green spaces in wintery and cold climates and its restorative benefits. This study utilized a pixel grid approach to quantify winter landscape characteristics and a self-reporting method to assess the restorative benefits of audiovisual interactions. The results show the following: (1) Different types of roads in urban parks have significant differences in their level of restorativeness, and the restorativeness benefits of the primary path in winter parks are the strongest. (2) The presence of snowy elements in winter landscapes can enhance park users’ potential to experience restorative characteristics in relation to “being away”. Moreover, there exists a noteworthy positive correlation between deciduous trees and their restoration benefits. (3) People’s perceptions of the tranquility of the soundscape and the duration of environmental exposure are critical mediators in the impact of the restorative path effect. (4) Compared with women, men have a higher restorative level in both the landscape and soundscape. This elucidates the restorative role of white space landscapes and soundscapes in public psychological perception when proposing appropriate forest-based healthcare strategies. It also provides theoretical guidance and optimization schemes for the overall planning, health planning, and design of white spaces shaped by cold urban green spaces.

Urban forests by the riverside are important habitats for various animals and contribute various soundscapes for citizens. Unfortunately, urban forests are exposed to the influence of riverside traffic noises from freeways. This study aims to explore the spatial and temporal variation of soundscape, conduct soundscape optimization for multiple parameters, and find a balance and its interval of soundscape elements through optimizing a soundscape map. Questionnaires and measuring equipment were used to gather soundscape information in an urban forested area in Fuzhou, China. Diurnal variations and soundscape mapping were used to analyze spatial and psychophysical relationships between soundscape drivers. We then conducted optimization for a soundscape map, which included normalization, critical value determination, target interval of optimal SPL determination, and modification of SPL and mapping. Our findings suggest that biological activities and natural phenomena are potential drivers for diurnal variation of soundscapes, especially tidal phenomena contributing water and shipping soundscapes. Our results also suggest that all the high values of perceived soundscapes were found at the southwest corner of the study area, which includes both riverside and urban forest elements. Furthermore, we suggest combining both optimal soundscape and SPL correction maps to aid in sustainable design in urban forests. This can contribute to the understanding and methodology of soundscape map optimization in urban forests when proposing suitable design plans and conservation of territorial sound.

Human soundscape perceptions exist through the perceived environment rather than the physical environment itself and are determined not only by the acoustic environment but also by the visual environment and their interaction. However, these relationships have mainly been established at the individual level, which may impede the efficient delivery of human-oriented considerations in improving the quality of large-scale urban spaces. Using the Chengdu Outer Ring Ecological Zone as an example, this study aims to develop an approach to predict human perceptions in large-scale urban green spaces. The site’s visual attributes, i.e., landscape composition, were calculated using space syntax and the quantum geographic information system (QGIS); its aural attributes, i.e., the sound level, were measured on site using a multi-channel signal analyzer; and its functional attributes, i.e., vitality, were documented through on-site observations and mapping. This was performed whilst obtaining people’s perceived soundscape through sound walks and a questionnaire-based on-site survey. The above environmental information was collected at micro-scale measurement spots selected within the site and then used together to formulate a model for predicting people’s soundscape perceptions in the whole site. The prediction results suggested that people’s perceived soundscape satisfaction increased as the distance from the ring road increased, and it gradually reached its highest level in the green spaces stretched outside the ring road. The prediction results of soundscape perception were then visualized using QGIS to develop planning and design implications, along with maps describing the site’s visual, aural, and functional features. Planning and design implications were suggested, including setting green buffers between noise sources and vulnerable areas; identifying and preserving areas with special visual and acoustic characteristics; employing sound shields around traffic facilities; and using natural landscapes to distract people’s attention from noise and to block their view of the source of noise. This study innovatively predicts individual-scale soundscape perception in large-scale UGSs based on environmental visual, aural, and functional characteristics through cross-level measurements, analyses, and model construction. By introducing a systematic perspective, the outcome of this study makes people’s soundscape perceptions more applicable in the planning and design practices of large-scale urban settings.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the connection between the soundscape of a forest park, restorative perception, and health benefits. In order to assess sound source perception, soundscape perception, restorative perception, and health benefits, 10 forest park environments in Fuzhou National Forest Park were chosen for sound walks. Correlation analysis, structural equation modeling, and mediating effects were used to analyze the relationships between the variables. The results showed that (1) the majority of natural sounds, like birdsong, had a positive correlation with soundscape perception with respect to being perceived as pleasant, harmonious, varied, and fluctuating; however, human-related and traffic noises had a negative correlation with perceptions of being pleasant and harmonious, and a positive correlation with perceptions of roughness. (2) The sound of running water and wind-blown leaves had strong favorable connections with emotional, cognitive, and behavioral restorative perceptions. The sound of birdsong was strongly correlated with restorative perceptions regarding emotional dimensions. The sound of wind held substantial favorable associations with emotional and cognitive restorative perceptions. Natural sounds, except for the sound of cicada chirping, had positive correlations with health benefits. The associations between human-related and mechanical sounds and restorative perception and health benefits were not statistically significant. (3) Soundscape pleasantness had a significant positive effect on restorative perceptions, and restorative perceptions had a significant positive effect on health benefits. The effect of soundscape pleasantness on health benefits was fully communicated through restorative perceptions. The annoyingness of a soundscape had no effect on restorative perception or health benefits. In the future, forest recreation activities based on soundscape perception could be carried out through the considered use of natural soundscape resources to promote health benefits.

A comprehensive and scientific recognition and evaluation of landscape resources is an important prerequisite for the sustainable development of global geoparks, but the existing research lacks specific means and methods. In the case of the Koktokay Global Geopark (GGp), for example, in this study, we used GIS spatial analysis, SBE, and a questionnaire survey method to construct a comprehensive evaluation path and method for an audio-visual landscape for global geoparks and further built an audio-visual preference matrix. The research results show the following: (1) The Shenzhong Canyon scenic area has the best visual evaluation effect, whereas the Golden Triangle has the worst evaluation effect. (2) Tourists are generally satisfied with the soundscapes of the ten scenic locations in the Koktokay GGp. In addition, tourists do not think that a higher or lower volume of a soundscape would make their experience more comfortable or pleasant, so an increase in the threshold value of the sound level to a level that tourists can bear while traveling is possible. (3) The Shenzhong Canyon area is located in the key landscape area; the Aiguzi Mine and Cocosuri are located in the landscape natural development area; the No. 3 Mine Pit, Eremu Lakes, the Golden Triangle, and the Karadrola Falls are located in the landscape subpriority improvement area; and the Waterfall Fossil, Betula Forest, and Karashanger Earthquake Fault Zone are located in the landscape priority improvement area. The comprehensive audio-visual landscape evaluation method constructed in this study provides a methodological tool for evaluating other similar landscapes and provides professional guidance for the protection and development of geoparks.

The dimension of sound plays a central role as a form of cultural representation. Sound is a means of knowledge and experiential involvement, as it is inextricably linked to place and space, mind and body, cultural context and emotion. This contribution aims to explore how sound design follows different paradigms and methods in the various media. Virtual reality, videogame, cinema and documentary have differently codified rules to provide acoustic verisimilitude to the simulated space, to orient or stimulate the user, to suggest contents or evoke events and to emotionally involve the public. These rules follow artistic principles closer to psychoacoustics than to scientific reproduction of sound in the simulated space. Under what conditions, however, is the scientific simulation of an acoustic space preferable to the more common paradigms of psychoacoustics? How could this be created? Immersive and non-immersive virtual reality for cultural heritage is currently the field of experimentation most open to future developments. Some virtual reality and mixed reality applications will be presented, dedicated to archaeological or historical-artistic contexts, where a fundamental relationship between sound and multisensory interaction has been created.

As urbanization accelerates, parks, as vital urban public open spaces, and their acoustic and thermal ambience directly impact visitors’ comfort and the sustainability of parks. Selecting Xihu Park in Fuzhou, China located in the subtropical region as a typical example, this study utilizes covert observational experiments with different typical sounds (grass cutting, music, and no sound source) across temperature levels to examine the influence of thermal–acoustic interactions on crowd behaviors in the park. The findings are as follows: (1) melodious music can attract more tourists, while strong stimulating grass cutting noises under high temperatures reduce crowd flow. Excluding unpleasant audio sources, park soundscapes across temperatures have a relatively limited influence on attractiveness to people flow. (2) High temperatures diminish tourists’ interest in landscape experiences and persons staying, especially when the soundscape quality is poorer. Under non-high temperatures, audio environments have a minor impact on the staying time. (3) The soundscape quality plays a role by affecting people’s path choices of approaching or avoiding sound sources, where grass cutting noise has the most negative influence. Music, grass cutting sounds, and natural sounds demonstrate conspicuous differences in their effects under varied temperatures. (4) Comfortable acoustic environments can draw larger crowds and decrease the walking pace. High temperatures make crowds take slower steps. Different sound types have significant influences on crowd movement velocity under three typical temperature levels. This study comprehensively investigates the mechanisms of typical thermal–acoustic environments’ impacts on park crowd behaviors, providing important references for optimizing the acoustic and thermal environments of urban parks, while also enriching related research on landscape design and environmental psychology. Future studies can conduct in-depth explorations by creating more abundant thermal–acoustic combinations and probe differences across diverse populations.

Several natural and historical areas around the world are listed as UNESCO Cultural Heritage Sites. Hanlar District, located in Bursa, is the fourth biggest city in Turkey, its history includes the Ottoman, Roman, and Byzantine Empires, and it is an area with unique environmental features that represent various historical periods. Scholars at institutions worldwide have already recognized that such an environment has unique characteristics, and so local authorities should preserve the soundscape of the district as the sounds reflect the urban identity of the city. This study aims to evaluate the sounds of this unique district and recommends ways to preserve the historical and cultural heritage of the site in terms of its sounds. After collecting more than seven hundred pieces of data on sound pressure levels (SPLs) at twenty-one locations, the SPLs were statistically analyzed (an ANOVA was used for different time intervals, and a t-test was used for different days). Noon and weekend measurements varied among the sites, and these variations were statistically significant. Furthermore, the SPLs were above the WHO’s suggested levels. The study findings show the importance of reducing sounds to create better acoustic environments. The local government should include all stakeholders, including residents, employees, and urban designers, in participatory approaches and action plans to preserve the sounds of cultural heritage sites.

This article discusses the twofold role of music as a means to manifest border-induced (cultural) difference and simultaneously foster alternative modes of belonging. The author draws on her ethnographic research, consisting of participant observation, desktop research, and interviews, and reflects on her auto-ethnographic recordings of engaging with refugee musicians. The discussion unfolds around vignettes that exemplify moments of musical encounters among refugees and between refugees and people from the host society. The vignettes are narrated from the refugee interlocutors’ point of view, who are engaged in the musicking instances as listeners and musicians. The article discusses how they devise music to cope with their estrangement from home and to articulate narratives of belonging. It illuminates how refugees challenge stereotyped representations of themselves, reinforcing the terms under which they can become “visible” and “audible.” Finally, the article argues that refugees’ narratives suggest understandings of reality as a continuum in ways that challenge the linear reifications produced by nation-state bordering practices and displacement-induced ruptures These understandings are embedded in music’s mobilities and their intersections with human movement, informal networks, and the cultural industry.

A soundscape is a sound environment of the awareness of auditory perception and social or cultural understandings. Based on a soundscape investigation in 2019 in the historical and ethnic village of Dong Nationality in Zhaoxing County, Guizhou Province of China, a case study on the soundscape analysis with the acoustical sound pressure level and an impressive sound event or soundmark is introduced in this paper. Furthermore, in order to determine the subjective soundscape experience and its influence by the length of background music listening, the independent variable “Length of Listening” and six adjective pairs, such as “Monotonous” to “Rich”, “Clamorous” to “Quiet”, “Stressing” to “Relaxing”, “Boring” to “Vivid”, “Noisy” to “Musical” and “Disliked” to “Preferable” are chosen to obtain a curve-fit, which shows that the length of the music listening background has a higher correlation to the subjective experience, and no sufficient attention has been paid to the context of the traditional soundscape preservation, ethnic music and quiet and soft ambient sounds.

The goal of estimating a soundscape index, aimed at evaluating the contribution of the environmental sound components, is to provide an accurate “acoustic quality” assessment of a complex habitat. Such an index can prove to be a powerful ecological tool associated with both rapid on-site and remote surveys. The soundscape ranking index (SRI), introduced by us recently, can empirically account for the contribution of different sound sources by assigning a positive weight to natural sounds (biophony) and a negative weight to anthropogenic ones. The optimization of such weights was performed by training four machine learning algorithms (decision tree, DT; random forest, RF; adaptive boosting, AdaBoost; support vector machine, SVM) over a relatively small fraction of a labeled sound recording dataset. The sound recordings were taken at 16 sites distributed over an area of approximately 22 hectares at Parco Nord (Northern Park) of the city Milan (Italy). From the audio recordings, we extracted four different spectral features: two based on ecoacoustic indices and the other two based on mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCCs). The labeling was focused on the identification of sounds belonging to biophonies and anthropophonies. This preliminary approach revealed that two classification models, DT and AdaBoost, trained by using 84 extracted features from each recording, are able to provide a set of weights characterized by a rather good classification performance (F1-score = 0.70, 0.71). The present results are in quantitative agreement with a self-consistent estimation of the mean SRI values at each site that was recently obtained by us using a different statistical approach.

This paper tackles the challenging task of automatically predicting the floor of a balcony based on a sound bound of two minutes recorded on that balcony. The sound fragments are typical of the environment, as nothing out of the usual can be heard in them. However, there is a good probability that, when hearing a fragment in quiet surroundings with consistent metropolitan background noise, it would not be straightforward to determine or estimate the floor height. In our experiments, it was found that sound chunks lasting 5 s can be identified with high accuracy even with a small number of training samples. In addition, when using a late fusion strategy to combine the outputs of classifiers trained on two modalities of the sound tracks, the floors of these bands are perfectly correctly classified. This result was consistent throughout all twenty tests when training and test sets were chosen at random, supporting the viability of the suggested method.

We have performed a detailed analysis of the soundscape inside an urban park (located in the city of Milan) based on simultaneous sound recordings at 16 locations within the park. The sound sensors were deployed over a regular grid covering an area of about 22 hectares, surrounded by a variety of anthropophonic sources. The recordings span 3.5 h each over a period of four consecutive days. We aimed at determining a soundscape ranking index (SRI) evaluated at each site in the grid by introducing 4 unknown parameters. To this end, a careful aural survey from a single day was performed in order to identify the presence of 19 predefined sound categories within a minute, every 3 minutes of recording. It is found that all SRI values fluctuate considerably within the 70 time intervals considered. The corresponding histograms were used to define a dissimilarity function for each pair of sites. Dissimilarity was found to increase significantly with the inter-site distance in space. Optimal values of the 4 parameters were obtained by minimizing the standard deviation of the data, consistent with a fifth parameter describing the variation of dissimilarity with distance. As a result, we classify the sites into three main categories: “poor”, “medium” and “good” environmental sound quality. This study can be useful to assess the quality of a soundscape in general situations.

Songbirds are one of the study targets for both bioacoustic and ecoacoustic research. In this paper, we discuss the applicability of robot audition techniques to understand the dynamics of forest bird vocalizations in a soundscape measured in azimuth and elevation angles with a single 16-channel microphone array, using HARK and HARKBird. First, we evaluated the accuracy in estimating the azimuth and elevation angles of bird vocalizations replayed from a loudspeaker on a tree, 6.55 m above the height of the array, from different horizontal distances in a forest. The results showed that the localization error of azimuth and elevation angle was equal to or less than 5 degrees and 15 degrees, respectively, in most of cases when the horizontal distance from the array was equal to or less than 35 m. We then conducted a field observation of vocalizations to monitor birds in a forest. The results showed that the system can successfully detect how birds use the soundscape horizontally and vertically. This can contribute to bioacoustic and ecoacoustic research, including behavioral observations and study of biodiversity.

A crowd can be both a sound source and an absorber. The sound of human voices significantly impacts evaluations of acoustic indicators in urban public spaces. This study aimed to investigate whether human sound impacts evaluations of the overall environment from both visual and auditory aspects. Primary sound sources and scenes in Harbin, China urban public space served as the research object. Four sets of sound sources and six sets of images were collected in situ in urban public spaces. A subjective evaluation of both visual and auditory aspects was then performed in the laboratory. The results showed that when different types of sounds in urban public spaces are superimposed with human sound, the volume of human sound (45.6 dBA, 55.6 dBA, and 65.6 dBA) significantly affects the acoustic evaluation of the environment. When the superimposed sounds were birds and music, the evaluation of the environment decreased with the human voice increasing in volume. Crowd density and the surrounding visual environment also influence evaluations of the overall sound environment. In this study, the sound preference and acoustic comfort of birdsong and music decreased as the human sound volume increased. The effect of human sound combined with traffic sounds significantly decreased the scores for sound preference and acoustic comfort at higher volumes. The results of the experiments on audio–visual interactions in which people evaluated visual scenes showed that the influence of the visual density of a crowd on assessments of the sound environment is negatively related to the magnitude of the sound of the crowd. When human voices are at 45.6 dBA and 65.6dBA, there is a significant effect on the evaluation of visual scenes for high-density people. When the sound pressure level of human voices is the same, changes in the visual environment are more likely to affect people’s evaluation of the overall sound environment.

This paper seeks to develop some conceptual elements that articulated the social construction of the soundscape of the urban spaces of the kingdom of Castile (15th–16th centuries). We focus our attention on the revision of the normative spheres that structured the subjective universe of the Castilian inhabitants, in order to notice and spot the different sound representations that intervened in the spatial and social configuration of the cities, their possible conflicts, and levels of acoustic tolerance. This proposal is part of the so-called “sensorial turn” in the Social Sciences, defined by David Howes as a cultural approach to the study of the senses as well as a sensorial approach to the study of culture. The research is carried out through the analysis of the sensory marks present in a documentary corpus made up of normative documents (municipal ordinances, books of agreement, chapter acts, diocesan synods, and royal dispositions) and judicial documents (General Archive of Simancas) combining methods of discourse analysis and the history of the senses. In the article, we argue and remark that the sound dimension operated as a device that acted in the shaping of the identity of places, since it contributed to define and delimit their use. This was reflected in the importance given by the authorities to the normative regulation of the community, which included a textual dimension in which the historical soundscape was imprinted, revealing the multiple social interactions that integrated it.

In a leading article by Sir Percival Philips in the UK popular newspaper, the Daily Mail, July 16, 1928, came the following headlines: “Millions Lost by Noise – Cities’ Worst Plague – Menace to Nerves and Health – What is Being Done to Stop it”. The article was supported by research from Prof Henry J. Spooner, who had been researching and campaigning on the ill-effects of noise and its economic impact. The article sparked subsequent discussion and follow-up articles in the Daily Mail and its international partners. In an era of rapid technological change, that was on the cusp of implementing sound pressure measurements, the Daily Mail, in collaboration with the Columbia Graphophone Company Ltd, experimented with sound recording technology and commentary in the field to help communicate perceived loudness and identify the sources of “unnecessary noise”. This resulted in the making of series of environmental sound recordings from five locations across central London during September 1928, the findings of which were documented and discussed in the Daily Mail at the time, and two recordings commercially released by Columbia on shellac gramophone disc. This was probably the first concerted anti-noise campaign of this type and scale, requiring huge technological efforts. The regulatory bodies and politicians of the time reviewed and improved the policies around urban noise shortly after the presentation of the recordings, which were also broadcast from the BBC both nationally and internationally, and many members of the public congratulated and thanked the Daily Mail for such an initiative. Despite its unpreceded scale and impact, and the recent scholarly attention on the history of anti-noise campaigning, this paper charts and contextualises the Daily Mail’s London Street Noise campaign for the first time. As well as historical research, this data has also been used to start a longitudinal comparative study still underway, returning to make field recordings on the site on the 80th and 90th anniversaries and during the COVID-19 lockdown, and shared on the website londonstreetnoises.co.uk.

Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR) is a simulated technology used to deliver multisensory information to people under different environmental conditions. When IVR is generally applied in urban planning and soundscape research, it reveals attractive possibilities for the assessment of urban sound environments with higher immersion for human participation. In virtual sound environments, various topics and measures are designed to collect subjective responses from participants under simulated laboratory conditions. Soundscape or noise assessment studies during virtual experiences adopt an evaluation approach similar to in situ methods. This paper aims to review the approaches that are utilized to assess the ecological validity of IVR for the perception of urban sound environments and the necessary technologies during audio–visual reproduction to establish a dynamic IVR experience that ensures ecological validity. The review shows that, through the use of laboratory tests including subjective response surveys, cognitive performance tests and physiological responses, the ecological validity of IVR can be assessed for the perception of urban sound environments. The reproduction system with head-tracking functions synchronizing spatial audio and visual stimuli (e.g., head-mounted displays (HMDs) with first-order Ambisonics (FOA)-tracked binaural playback) represents the prevailing trend to achieve high ecological validity. These studies potentially contribute to the outcomes of a normalized evaluation framework for subjective soundscape and noise assessments in virtual environments.

Sound is a memory carrier in places with rich history and culture, which can invoke place memories and images. The purpose of this paper is to explore the effect of soundscape on place attachment in different types of historical blocks. Six historical blocks in Harbin, China, were selected, and a questionnaire survey was conducted to evaluate place attachment and soundscape. The soundscape evaluations of harmony, quietness and nature were significantly higher in residential historical blocks than in tourism historical blocks. The mechanical sound source preference of residential historical blocks was lower than that of tourism historical blocks. The main components of place attachment were place bonding and identity, and place dependence, but in different orders in different types of historical blocks. In tourism historical blocks, the preference of sound source helps to enhance place attachment, especially the sounds of activities and equipment related to the history and culture of the blocks. Soundscapes promote place attachment in tourism historical blocks and are positively correlated with place satisfaction. There was no significant correlation between soundscape and place attachment in the residential historical blocks surveyed.

Soundscapes are important resources and contribute to high-quality visiting experiences in scenic areas. Based on a public investigation of 195 interviewees in the Kulangsu scenic area, this study aimed to explore the relationships between the harmonious degree of sound sources (SHD) and visiting experience indicators, in terms of soundscape perception, as well as the satisfaction degree of visual landscape and comprehensive impression. The results suggested that the dominating positions of human sounds did not totally suppress the perception of natural sounds such as birdsong and sea waves in the scenic area. Natural sound sources also showed a higher harmonious degree than other artificial sounds. Significant relationships existed between the SHD of most sound sources and the visiting experience indicators. Natural sounds were closely related to pleasant and comfortable soundscape perception, while mechanical sound sources were mainly related to eventful and varied soundscapes. The close relationships between certain sound sources and the satisfaction degree of the visual landscape and comprehensive impression evaluation indicated the effectiveness of audio-visual and even multi-sensory approaches to enhance visiting experience. The structural equation model further revealed that (1) natural sound was the most influential sound source of soundscape and visual landscape perception; (2) human sounds and mechanical sounds all showed significant positive effects on soundscape perception; and (3) indirect relationships could exist in the SHD of sound sources with comprehensive impression evaluation. The results can facilitate targeted soundscape and landscape management and landsense creation with the aim of improving visiting experience.

The soundscape of waterfront space in mountainous cities (WSMC) can affect people’s physical and mental health. Taking seven WSMCs in Chongqing, China, as the study area, this study aimed to investigate the soundscape and explore the influence of spatial characteristics and visual and smell environments on the soundscape of WSMCs through a sensewalking approach. The results show that the soundscape evaluations of WSMCs are of poor quality, and traffic sounds are dominant (33%). Among spatial characteristics, the position relative to the road (including vertical and horizontal distances) had a greater impact than other spatial indicators on soundscape evaluations. Elevation was positively correlated with the A-weighted equivalent sound level (LAeq) and negatively correlated with the soundscape comfort degree (SCD). In terms of visual elements, the proportions of paved ground, pedestrians, and buildings had negative effects on the soundscape, while those of the sky, water, and natural terrain had positive effects. High visual and smell environment quality can enhance soundscape evaluations, although the smell environment had a greater impact on the SCD than the visual environment in WSMCs. Finally, this study summarizes the recommended values of spatial characteristics and visual and smell environment indicators to put forward references for the soundscape design of WSMCs.

Natural soundscape is considered a dominant type of hearing in forested areas and contributes to health and recovery effects from exposure to the biophilic outdoor environment. This study focuses on the different forest structures, and aims to explore the relationship between perceived soundscape and acoustical parameters, observe physiological indicators, and model the physiological restorative role of soundscape. Questionnaires and measuring equipment were used to gather psychophysical and physiological information at 20 observation sites in urban forested areas. Back-propagation neural network techniques were conducted to determine the forecasting model from psychophysical to physiological parameters. Our results suggested that LAeq and L10 are important factors that influence questionnaire responses. Our findings also showed that electromyogram (EMG) signals were the most obvious and sensitive in physiological parameters. Additionally, we found that L10–90 played the most important role among all physical parameters in the physiological restorativeness soundscape model. This can facilitate the understanding of the physiological restorative role of soundscape in different forest structures when proposing suitable forest-based health care strategies.

Coronavirus disease 2019 has significantly impacted mental health. Urban green spaces’ ecological function can improve citizens’ well-being and mental health; thus, this study explored the value realisation mechanism of ecological products in green space by examining the impact of urban green space soundscape on citizens’ emotions. Additionally, we investigated citizens’ subjective perceptions and emotional changes in soundscape through questionnaires. An A-weighted sound pressure level meter was used to measure the sound pressure levels at three points in a day to obtain the sound pressure level changes during different day periods in a park. Subsequently, the universal conclusion through a comparative analysis of the sound pressure level change in urban parks during the day was roughly ‘M’ shape. Further, a structural equation model analysed the influence of different soundscape on public sentiment and used a multigroup analysis to examine the difference in the impact of natural sounds in summer and winter on the change in public opinion. The results show that natural and living sounds positively affect citizens’ emotions, whereas mechanical sounds negatively affect citizens’ emotions. Furthermore, natural sounds in summer positively affect citizens’ moods significantly. Conversely, natural sounds in winter negatively affect citizens’ attitudes, but this is not obvious. Finally, this study proposed some suggestions for managing and improving urban green space soundscape.

Urban parks provide their residents with a space for activities and interactions, and soundscapes play an important role in influencing the residents’ sense of experience of the park environment, with the result that the preferences of residents regarding multiple sound sources can be used as the basis of improving the soundscape quality and optimizing the function of urban parks. Using Shanghai Century Park as the research area, this study focused on the residents’ preference to multiple sound sources based on registered residence differences, and comprehensively used the semantic differential method, importance-performance analysis model, and multinomial logit model to conduct quantitative research on urban park soundscapes and combined the measurement results of the soundscape with the residents’ perception and preference. The results showed that the artificial sounds in Century Park were noisy during the morning and evening peak, while the human sounds were noisy when residents gathered in the park. There was a close relationship between the favorability and subjective loudness of urban park soundscapes, and the residents’ perceptions of urban park soundscapes substantially differed in terms of loudness, tone, and sense of belonging, whereas the differences in the perception of timbre, coverage, and sound source distance were relatively small. Furthermore, it is necessary to enhance the role of natural sounds as well as control the main noise-producing sound sources so that various sounds in the park will not interfere with each other; the optimization of soundscapes should also focus on the residents’ different soundscape preferences due to their individual characteristics.

The development of China’s national parks is still in the initial stage, and few scholars have studied the effects of soundscapes on human physiology and psychology from the perspective of the auditory senses in national parks. In this study, the Qianjiangyuan National Park System Pilot Area was taken as the research subject, physiological indicators of subjects were collected through a biopAC-MP150 multi-channel physiological instrument data platform, and the subjective psychological response of soundscapes was measured using a Likert scale. The results showed that the sound of water had the most significant effect on the heart rate and respiratory rate of the subjects. Agricultural sound had the greatest impact on the skin conduction levels, while conversation had the least overall impact on human physiology. There were significant differences in comfort, excitement, and significance among the different soundscapes (p < 0.001). The sounds of insects are more likely to elicit feelings of comfort and excitement, while the sounds of birds are more likely to arouse curiosity. No significant correlation was observed between the physiological indices and psychological indices. The study on the effects of different soundscapes on human physiology and psychology in China’s national parks will provide a basis for the decision makers of national parks to formulate more effective planning, design, and management policies regarding soundscapes.

Invasive alien species (IAS) are a threat to biodiversity and ecosystem function worldwide. Unfortunately, researchers, agencies, and other management groups face the unresolved challenge of effectively detecting and monitoring IAS at large spatial and temporal scales. To improve the detection of soniferous IAS, we introduced a pipeline for large-scale passive acoustic monitoring (PAM). Our main goal was to illustrate how PAM can be used to rapidly provide baseline information on soniferous IAS. To that aim, we collected acoustic data across Puerto Rico from March to June 2021 and used single-species occupancy models to investigate species distribution of species in the archipelago and to assess the peak of vocal activity. Overall, we detected 16 IAS (10 birds, 3 mammals, and 3 frogs) and 79 native species in an extensive data set with 1,773,287 1-min recordings. Avian activity peaked early in the morning (between 5 a.m. and 7 a.m.), while amphibians peaked between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. Occupancy probability for IAS in Puerto Rico ranged from 0.002 to 0.67. In general, elevation and forest cover older than 54 years were negatively associated with IAS occupancy, corroborating our expectation that IAS occurrence is related to high levels of human disturbance and present higher occupancy probabilities in places characterized by more intense human activities. The work presented here demonstrates that PAM is a workable solution for monitoring vocally active IAS over a large area and provides a reproducible workflow that can be extended to allow for continued monitoring over longer timeframes.

Soundscape perception is increasingly recognized as an important part of landscape preference and environmental experience. However, few studies have juxtaposed visual landscape preference and soundscape preference to compare their contributions to overall landscape preference. This paper aims to quantify and compare the contribution of audiovisual perception to visitors’ overall park landscape preference. The landscape preferences of visitors at seven sample sites in a city park were investigated through field questionnaires in three dimensions: visual landscape, acoustic landscape, and audiovisual landscape. The results showed that visitors’ visual landscape preference (VLP = 7.53) was generally higher than soundscape preference (SP = 7.08), while the influence of auditory preference (57%) on overall landscape preference (OLP) was found to be greater than that of visual preference (43%). The ratio of audio/visual contribution to the overall landscape preference decreased as the average sound level of the sample sites increased. Of all the population characteristics, only the educational level (sig = 0.034) could be used as an effective predictor of OLP (Impact coefficient = −0.103). In addition, older visitors rated OLP lower than young visitors, and females rated OLP lower than males. It was found that visual harmony, color richness, color contrast, plant coverage, and plant diversity were the main visual landscape attributes that influenced visitors’ visual preferences, while acoustic harmony, quietness, sound vitality, and acoustic richness were the main soundscape attributes that impacts visitors’ auditory preference. The results of this study may be useful for park landscape design and regeneration.

The quality of the natural sound environment is important for the well-being of humans and for urban sustainability. Therefore, it is important to study how the soundscape of the natural environment affects humans with respect to the different densities of vegetation, and how this affects the frequency of singing events and the sound pressure levels of common birds that generate natural sounds in a commonly visited urban park in Abuja, Nigeria. This study involves the recording of birdsongs, the measurement of sound pressure levels, and a questionnaire evaluation of sound perception and the degree of acoustic comfort in the park. Acoustic comfort, which affects humans, describes the fundamental feelings of users towards the acoustic environment. The results show that first, there is a significant difference between the frequency of singing events of birds for each category of vegetation density (low, medium, and high density) under cloudy and sunny weather conditions, but there is no significant difference during rainy weather. Secondly, the measured sound pressure levels of the birdsongs are affected by vegetation density. This study shows a significant difference between the sound pressure levels of birdsongs and the vegetation density under cloudy, sunny, and rainy weather conditions. In addition, the frequency of singing events of birds is affected by the sound pressure levels of birdsongs with respect to different vegetation densities under different weather conditions. Thirdly, the results from the respondents (N = 160) in this study indicated that the acoustic perception of the park was described as being pleasant, vibrant, eventful, calming, and not considered to be chaotic or annoying in any sense. It also shows that the human perception of birdsong in the park was moderately to strongly correlated with different densities of vegetation, and that demographics play an important role in how natural sounds are perceived in the environment under different weather conditions.

The goal of this study is to investigate the psychophysiological effects of traffic sounds in urban green spaces. In a laboratory experiment, psychological and physiological responses to four traffic sounds were measured, including road, conventional train, high-speed train, and tram. The findings demonstrated that traffic sounds had significant detrimental psychological and physiological effects. In terms of psychological responses, the peak sound level outperformed the equivalent sound level in determining the psychological impact of traffic sounds. The physiological effects of traffic sounds were shown to be significantly influenced by sound type and sound level. The physiological response to the high-speed train sound differed significantly from the other three traffic sounds. The physiological effects of road traffic sounds were found to be unrelated to the sound level. On the contrary, as for the railway sounds, the change in sound level was observed to have a significant impact on the participants’ physiological indicators.

The acoustic evaluation of indoor environments is common in the application of virtual acoustics. In addition, in the study of cultural heritage buildings, it is a useful tool, but it is not so common when describing the acoustic environment in intangible cultural heritage events and even in outdoor environments. In this paper, the acoustic environment of the Water Tribunal of the Plain of Valencia (Spain) is studied. It is analyzed from a soundscape perspective, characterizing the sound source and evaluating it within relation to the environment and evaluating its subjective response. With the research carried out, it has been obtained, on the one hand, a complete study of the acoustics of the environment of the Water Tribunal and, on the other, an enhancement of the Valencian tangible and intangible heritage.