Community annoyance toward transportation noise: Review of a 4-year comprehensive survey in Korea

Since the first synthesis curves were reported, a number of social surveys have been conducted to assess community response to noise, and determine a suitable exposure-response relationship for each socio-cultural area within different environments. Generalized exposure-response relationships have been reported using meta-analysis, which are used for predicting noise annoyance and as the basis for noise policy. However, these studies were primarily conducted in European and English-speaking communities, and studying community response in different cultural contexts is important to the development of more comprehensive exposure-response relationships. Furthermore, in some cases, case-specific exposure-relationships may better predict community response than generalized exposure-response relationships. This study presents the exposure-response relationships for the subjective annoyance of people exposed to commercial aircraft, railway, and road traffic noise for an extended period of time. Using our new analysis standard, we re-analyzed data from large-scale investigations conducted as part of a 4-year comprehensive survey comprising 52 datasets, and established modified exposure-response relationships for three types of transport noise in Korea. We found significant differences in annoyance response compared to previous studies, including the study which was used in the development process of WHO/Europe’s environmental noise guidelines. We propose that the exposure-response relationships established in our study are the most optimal curves currently available for predicting community annoyance to transportation noise in Korea. Furthermore, we suggest that future research focus on differences in annoyance responses due to the effects of non-acoustic factors.