Humans and the sound environment
We are surrounded by sounds everyday, whether we are inside a building or outdoors. These sounds have an influence on our body and state-of-mind. The Building Acoustics group has a focal area of research on the effects of the sound environment on humans to get more insight into the mechanisms that cause health effects and influence performance.
The effects of sound on performance
coming soon
The effects of sound on health
Environmental sound or noise affects people in terms of annoyance, sleep disturbance, increased risk to get cardiovascular diseases, hearing damage (i.e. tinnitus) and cognitive impairment. The world health organization (WHO) quantified these effects by estimating the healthy life years that are lost due to the exposure to noise. Estimated to be between 1 and 1.6 million in 2011.
In our current health related project, the Equal-Life project, we focus on quantifying the exposure of children and assessing the relationship with current health effects and health effects that develop over a life time.
Researchers
- Prof. Maarten Hornikx, Full professor
- Maud Dohmen, PhD student
- Michalis Terzakis, PhD student
- Dr. Ella Braat-Eggen, Alumni (graduated PhD in 2020)
- Dr. Jikke Reinten, Alumni (graduated PhD in 2020)
Related Projects
- Equal-Life: Early Environmental quality and life-course mental health effects, 2020-2025, Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
- The relationship between the acoustics of open-plan work environments and well-being and (learning) performance of users, 2014-2018, Avans University of Applied Sciences
Building Acoustics TU/e 