Effect of soundscape on emotional response in an urban acoustical environment

The emotional response in soundscapes has long been the centre of the soundscape field. Despite the efforts of researcher and practitioners, the results on emotional response remain fragmented and inconsistent. This thesis aims to systematically explore the emotional responses in soundscape. By adopting theory from emotional study, this thesis aims to view the subjective assessment of the acoustical environment through the lens of emotional processes.
The thesis started with a case study (Chapter 4) to identify and explore all acoustical and environmental stimuli that have the potential to influence emotional responses. The case study was conducted on-site and provided a preliminary examination of the identified stimuli. The identified stimuli included weather conditions (daylight difference and thermal conditions) and sound types (street music, shop music, traffic sound, machinery sound and fountain sounds). Six mood states were studied: anger; confusion; depression; fatigue; tension; and vigour. The results showed that lighting and thermal condition do not impact people’s mood states; music from street performances reduces negative mood states; music from shops increases negative mood states, especially tension; and nature sounds have a non-significant influence on mood states, as do monotonous sounds such as traffic and machinery.
The second and third studies (Chapters 5 and 6, respectively) further examined the stimuli that were found to have a significant influence on emotional responses in the initial case study in the laboratory setting. With the controlled environment of the laboratory, the results of the two studies eliminated bias from the result of the initial case study. The study in Chapter 5 focused on the effect of sound types on emotional responses and the study in Chapter 6 focused on the environmental context and aimed to identify their effect on emotional responses when perceiving acoustical environments.