Aural Architecture as Affect: Understanding the Impact of Acoustic Environments on Human Experience

Abstract

Architectural design plays a significant role in shaping human experience in buildings through the perception of space. However, architectural characteristics not only result in visual attributes that affect how the occupants see the space, but they also create auditory environments that impact what the occupants hear based on sound propagation and reflections from surfaces. Yet, architectural acoustics’ physical measurements do not precisely reflect the human acoustical experience because other perceptual and cultural aspects contribute to it, as the aural architecture approach suggests. The perceptual aspect deals with the psychological and physiological effects of sound and its relation to human cognition and emotions, while the cultural aspect focuses on the role of cultural background in sound perception. This research offers a comprehensive approach that allows for a deeper understanding of such experience by studying the interaction between the physical, perceptual, and cultural aspects of acoustics. Since worship spaces offer an example in which the spiritual experience is dependent on the acoustic environment, this study adopts them as case studies aiming to answer the following questions: how does an acoustic environment influence human experience and emotions? What are the acoustic characteristics and parameters related to that emotional impact? What are the links between the acoustic characteristics and the emotional impact? This research analyzes the experience by recreating acoustics using virtual reality technology and subjective methods that include self-report in addition to objective methods that include physiological measurements (i.e., heart rate and skin conductance), to validate the results. The results demonstrated that the acoustic environment amplifies the intensity of the emotional impact depending on the building’s architectural design and that familiarity with sound and acoustic characteristics can increase this impact. Then, the research proposes a method to investigate the response of the room to the excitation by the sound source considering its architectural characteristics through frequency-domain analysis based on auralization. The auralization-based method named (multiple convolutions) proved its ability to identify room modes that create resonance for spaces with complex geometries, such as worship spaces, taking into account the architectural surfaces’ materials and the source location. Finally, the study analyzes the room acoustics’ parameters and includes a correlational analysis to develop indicators for studying the auditory experience and to establish guidelines for designing spaces that enhance it. The correlation between the emotional impact of spaces and their acoustic parameters illustrated the significance of low frequencies in the emotional impact of worship spaces and raised the issue of considering these frequencies when analyzing and designing such spaces. Consequently, the research calls for further studies on the architectural characteristics of acoustic environments that impact emotions and enhance well-being.