The Psychoacoustic Variables of Urban Water Features and Their Effect on Human Restoration and Physiology
What do different water sounds do for people in urban places?
This study measures people’s physiological responses to inform the bluespace design.
The Psychoacoustic Variables of Urban Water Features and Their Effect on Human Restoration and Physiology
Are urban water features designed and installed only for the sake of aesthetic, ecological, or semantic reasons? While visual stimulation, environmental benefits, and personal associations cannot be ignored, an understudied area of research is the soundscape created by these water features and the physiological changes effecting restoration and stress recovery that they can create. Different urban water features generate different soundscapes varying in psychoacoustic variables which include sharpness, fluctuation strength, loudness, and roughness, and these audible characteristics may cause discernable physiological changes in humans. Furthermore, many of these physiological changes are related to stress reduction and recovery. Laro-Wright et al. (2016) described that “there is no known research on the effect of nature sound alone on health-related outcomes,” stating that previous research had seemingly only focused on self-reported psychological evaluations (Largo-Wright, O’Hara, Chen, 2016). More recently, there has been an increase in physiological studies pertaining to the effects of nature sounds (Engel et al., 2021) such as bird songs, wind, and water (Michels, Hamers, 2023). Using virtual reality, this thesis will explore physiological and perceptual changes associated with restoration wrought by the soundscape of different urban water features. The results of this exploration may provide guidance to landscape architects when making design choices surrounding water features and emphasize the importance of particular soundscapes which are essential to restoration and stress recovery (Hubbard, Kimball, 1929; Michels, Hamers, 2023). Findings may lead to suggestions and considerations for practitioners when designing bluespaces to maximize the restorative impact of the acoustics.