Systematic literature review on the association between soundscape and ecological/human wellbeing

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1 Department Evolution, Behaviour and Environment, School of Life Sciences, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK
2 Department of Music, University of Sussex, Brighton, United Kingdom
DOI
10.7287/peerj.preprints.6570v2
Published
Accepted
Subject Areas
Conservation Biology, Coupled Natural and Human Systems, Natural Resource Management
Keywords
health, machine learning, sounds, wellbeing, welfare, ecological health, noise, bibliometric networks
Copyright
© 2018 Moscoso et al.
Licence
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
Cite this article
Moscoso P, Peck M, Eldridge A. 2018. Systematic literature review on the association between soundscape and ecological/human wellbeing. PeerJ Preprints 6:e6570v2

Abstract

Background. Wellbeing issues are increasingly incorporated within conservation biology and environmental sciences, both in academic research and in applied policies such as the global sustainable development plans. The role of landscape on human wellbeing has been widely reported, but a comprehensive understanding of the role of soundscape has yet to be explicated. Research on the influences of sound on wellbeing has been conducted across a range of disciplines, but integration of findings is impeded by linguistic and cultural differences across disciplinary boundaries. This study presents the largest systematic literature review (2499 publications) of research to date, addressing the association between soundscape and human/ecological wellbeing.

Method. It is divided in two components: 1. rapid visualisation of publication metrics using the software VOS Viewer, and 2. analysis of the categories of wellbeing associated with soundscape using the natural language processing platform, Method52. The first component presents network diagrams created from keyword searches and cited references (lexical, temporal, spatial and source networks) that explain the origin and evolution of the field, the influences between disciplines and the main contributors to the field. Research on the topic, occurring mostly between 2004 and 2016, evolved from a medical/physiological focus, into technological and psychological/social considerations, and finally into ecological/social research.

Results. The evolution of the field was associated with the diversification of terminology and the evolution of new branches of research. Moreover, research appears to have evolved from the study of particular associations between sound and health, to an integrative multidimensional field addressing soundscape and wellbeing, across human and non-human species, including ecologically based studies. The second component includes a trained classifier that categorizes publications, based on keywords analysis, into three frameworks for understanding the association between soundscape and wellbeing: ‘Human health’, ‘Social and Cultural wellness’ and ‘Ecological integrity’.

Conclusion. This novel methodology is shown to be an effective tool for analysing large collections of data in short periods of time. In order to address the gaps found during the study, it is recommended to increase research conducted in and by non-western societies and in non-English languages, and the exploration of ecological and sociocultural aspects of wellbeing associated with soundscape.

Author Comment

Version 2 has a few small changes: 1. Author details were corrected; 2. Small orthographic/grammatical edits were made in the abstract and the introduction; 3. Figures with higher resolution replaced figures of version 1.

Supplemental Information

Database of publication on "Soundscape and its association with ecological and ecological wellbeing"

Database of publications on "Soundscape and its association with ecological and ecological wellbeing" used for the systematic literature review. Publications were compiled in peer-reviewed publication databases SCOPUS and Web of Science.

DOI: 10.7287/peerj.preprints.6570v2/supp-3

Co-occurrence of key-words analysis

Bibliographic metrics of the analysis of co-occurrence of key-words

DOI: 10.7287/peerj.preprints.6570v2/supp-4

Sources contributing to the field

Publication metrics by sources that contributes mostly to the field of research.

DOI: 10.7287/peerj.preprints.6570v2/supp-5

Countries contributing to the field

Publication metrics by countries that contributes mostly to the field.

DOI: 10.7287/peerj.preprints.6570v2/supp-6