The effect of music on the perception of outdoor urban environment

Abstract

Music may modify the impression of a visual environment. Most studies have explored the effect of music on the perception of various service settings, but the effect of music on the perception of outdoor environments has not yet been adequately explored. Music may make an environment more pleasant and enhance the relaxation effect of outdoor recreational activities. This study investigated the effect of music on the evaluation of urban built and urban natural environments. The participants (N = 94) were asked to evaluate five environments in terms of spatio-cognitive and emotional dimensions while listening to music. Two types of music were selected: music with a fast tempo and music with a slow tempo. In contrast with a previous study by Yamasaki, Yamada & Laukka (2015), our experiment revealed that there was only a slight and not significant influence of music on the evaluation of the environment. The effect of music was mediated by the liking of music, but only in the dimensions of Pleasant and Mystery. The environmental features of the evaluated locations had a stronger effect than music on the evaluation of the environments. Environments with natural elements were perceived as more pleasant, interesting, coherent, and mysterious than urban built environments regardless of the music. It is suggested that the intensity of music may be an important factor in addition to the research methodology, individual variables, and cultural differences.

How music can change evaluations of social situations: Exploring the influence of emotional states and perceived group characteristics

“…For instance, an audiovisual experiment on car simulation (Iwamiya, 1997) found that listening to music makes landscapes appear more pleasant than without music and that they are generally evaluated congruently with musical features. This has also been shown in various field experiments (Ehret et al, 2021;Franěk et al, 2020;Yamasaki et al, 2015). The interplay between musical features and environmental features (e.g., natural or urban environment, valence of atmosphere) is crucial for how perception is altered.…”

“…This suggests that affective evaluations are more likely to be influenced by the emotional state of the perceiver than cognitive evaluations, as already noted by Russell et al (1981). Consequently, cognitive evaluations are more likely to be influenced by the environment itself and objective features than by the individual's emotional state or by music (Franěk et al, 2020).…”

“…By directing participants to different locations while listening to music that varied in activation and valence, Yamasaki et al (2015) showed that listening to music modulates environmental perception on affective evaluations corresponding to musical features (e.g., relaxing, pleasant), with incongruence between musical and environmental features leading to a greater musical influence on environmental evaluations (e.g., relaxing music in crowded environments). Franěk et al (2020) investigated the influence of music on environmental ratings such as openness, pleasantness, energy, and mystery. The researchers found only small effects for pleasantness and mystery and concluded that the environment itself, rather than the music, is more relevant to the evaluation.…”

“…In the age of mobile music players and headphones that allow people to listen to music in public spaces, the question of how music influences the perception of environments is becoming increasingly relevant. While the evaluation of environments depends primarily on physical and social features, several experimental studies report differences in the evaluation of environments as a function of the music listened to (e.g., Ehret et al, 2021;Franěk et al, 2020;Yamasaki et al, 2015). Perceptual shifts leading to different ratings could be explained by mood-congruency effects (e.g., Bower, 1981;Forgas, 1994), according to which cognitive processes are influenced by affective states in a congruent manner.…”

The Association of Cadence and the Weather Across Healthy Adults and Mobility Impaired Disease Groups (Preprint)

“…Contextual factors cannot be fully considered and accounted for when measuring in a laboratory. Contextual factors known to impact on real-world walking speed and cadence include the weather [16], the walkability of the environment, the purpose of the journey, the commonality of the route, elevation (gradient) of pathway [17]. Contextual factors can be recorded and accessed through smartphone data.…”