A Review of Socio-acoustic Surveys for Soundscape Studies

Abstract

This article reviews the literature and presents the current status of the use of socio-acoustic surveys in soundscape studies, through the indication of appropriate question formats, types, and topics for each data collection method (soundwalks, interviews, listening tests, and focus group) for the involved public and acoustic stimuli. The ISO 12913-2 establishes ways of data collection and reporting requirements for soundscape studies (International Organization for Standartization 2017), including the triangulation technique. This standard recommends some data collection methods, like soundwalks and interviews. Even so, some authors are using different methods to collect data, such as focus group and listening tests. This study investigated through 52 peer-reviewed papers published on the last 20 years the current status of socio-acoustic studies regarding question topics and types, used stimuli, and characteristics about the participants, using the four major adopted data collection methods in soundscape studies: soundwalks, interviews, listening tests, and focus group. Some topics like “soundscape quality” and “sound sources identification and evaluation” are common in the recent studies, as well as the adoption of some question types such as semantic differential scale, the staple scale, and ranking order scale.