A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds

To investigate the effect of augmenting natural sounds in noisy environments, an in-situ experiment was conducted using a mixed-reality head-mounted display (MR HMD). Two outdoor locations close to an expressway were selected for the experiment. A natural sound (birdsong or stream) along with a holo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Hong, Joo Young, Lam, Bhan, Ong, Zhen-Ting, Ooi, Kenneth, Gan, Woon-Seng, Kang, Jian, Yeong, Samuel, Lee, Irene, Tan, Sze-Tiong
Other Authors: School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10356/146637
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Institution: Nanyang Technological University
Language: English
id sg-ntu-dr.10356-146637
record_format dspace
spelling sg-ntu-dr.10356-1466372021-03-04T01:22:41Z A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds Hong, Joo Young Lam, Bhan Ong, Zhen-Ting Ooi, Kenneth Gan, Woon-Seng Kang, Jian Yeong, Samuel Lee, Irene Tan, Sze-Tiong School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering Smart Nation Lab Engineering Soundscape Soundscape Intervention To investigate the effect of augmenting natural sounds in noisy environments, an in-situ experiment was conducted using a mixed-reality head-mounted display (MR HMD). Two outdoor locations close to an expressway were selected for the experiment. A natural sound (birdsong or stream) along with a hologram (sparrow/fountain or loudspeaker) was projected through the MR HMD. Participants were asked to adjust the natural sound levels to their preferred level under ambient traffic noise conditions at each location. Participants also assessed the perceived loudness of traffic (PLN) and overall soundscape quality (OSQ) in conditions with and without the augmented natural sounds. The results showed that both natural sounds significantly reduced the PLN and enhanced the OSQ. No significant differences in subjective responses were found between the loudspeaker and visual representations of the natural sound source as holograms. Analysis on the preferred signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), i.e. ratio of natural sound to traffic levels, indicated a strong negative correlation between the preferred SNRs and ambient traffic noise levels. Overall, the preferred SNR of the birdsong was significantly higher than that of the water sound. Among the acoustic parameters tested, the A-weighted traffic noise level was the strongest predictor for the preferred SNR of both the birdsong and water sound. However, the correlation for the water sound was relatively higher than the birdsong. This was due to the larger variance in the subjective evaluation for the birdsong. Ministry of National Development (MND) National Research Foundation (NRF) Accepted version This research/project is supported by the National Research Foundation, Singapore, and Ministry of National Development, Singapore under its Cities of Tomorrow R&D Programme (CoT Award: COT-V4-2020-1). Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the view of National Research Foundation, Singapore and Ministry of National Development, Singapore. 2021-03-04T01:22:40Z 2021-03-04T01:22:40Z 2021 Journal Article Hong, J. Y., Lam, B., Ong, Z.-T., Ooi, K., Gan, W.-S., Kang, J., ... Tan, S.-T. (2021). A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds. Building and Environment, 194, 107688-. doi:10.1016/j.buildenv.2021.107688 0360-1323 https://hdl.handle.net/10356/146637 10.1016/j.buildenv.2021.107688 194 107688 en COT-V4-2020-1 Building and Environment 10.21979/N9/KE0901 © 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. This paper was published in Building and Environment and is made available with permission of Elsevier Ltd. application/pdf
institution Nanyang Technological University
building NTU Library
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider NTU Library
collection DR-NTU
language English
topic Engineering
Soundscape
Soundscape Intervention
spellingShingle Engineering
Soundscape
Soundscape Intervention
Hong, Joo Young
Lam, Bhan
Ong, Zhen-Ting
Ooi, Kenneth
Gan, Woon-Seng
Kang, Jian
Yeong, Samuel
Lee, Irene
Tan, Sze-Tiong
A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
description To investigate the effect of augmenting natural sounds in noisy environments, an in-situ experiment was conducted using a mixed-reality head-mounted display (MR HMD). Two outdoor locations close to an expressway were selected for the experiment. A natural sound (birdsong or stream) along with a hologram (sparrow/fountain or loudspeaker) was projected through the MR HMD. Participants were asked to adjust the natural sound levels to their preferred level under ambient traffic noise conditions at each location. Participants also assessed the perceived loudness of traffic (PLN) and overall soundscape quality (OSQ) in conditions with and without the augmented natural sounds. The results showed that both natural sounds significantly reduced the PLN and enhanced the OSQ. No significant differences in subjective responses were found between the loudspeaker and visual representations of the natural sound source as holograms. Analysis on the preferred signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), i.e. ratio of natural sound to traffic levels, indicated a strong negative correlation between the preferred SNRs and ambient traffic noise levels. Overall, the preferred SNR of the birdsong was significantly higher than that of the water sound. Among the acoustic parameters tested, the A-weighted traffic noise level was the strongest predictor for the preferred SNR of both the birdsong and water sound. However, the correlation for the water sound was relatively higher than the birdsong. This was due to the larger variance in the subjective evaluation for the birdsong.
author2 School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
author_facet School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Hong, Joo Young
Lam, Bhan
Ong, Zhen-Ting
Ooi, Kenneth
Gan, Woon-Seng
Kang, Jian
Yeong, Samuel
Lee, Irene
Tan, Sze-Tiong
format Article
author Hong, Joo Young
Lam, Bhan
Ong, Zhen-Ting
Ooi, Kenneth
Gan, Woon-Seng
Kang, Jian
Yeong, Samuel
Lee, Irene
Tan, Sze-Tiong
author_sort Hong, Joo Young
title A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
title_short A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
title_full A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
title_fullStr A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
title_full_unstemmed A mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
title_sort mixed-reality approach to soundscape assessment of outdoor urban environments augmented with natural sounds
publishDate 2021
url https://hdl.handle.net/10356/146637
_version_ 1696984382254874624