title: Source-based subjective responses to sleep disturbance from transportation noise.
abstract: There is increasing evidence to suggest that the use of subjective responses to questions concerning night-time environmental noise exposure is a robust method of assessing sleep disturbance from road traffic noise. However, there have only been a few studies exploring this issue in a real world context beyond controlled laboratory settings. This paper presents results from such a study. It utilises 208 household questionnaire surveys to assess subjective responses to levels of night-time sleep disturbance and annoyance from four different residential sites. Each residential site is characterised by a dominant noise source - road, light rail, and aircraft - and these sites are compared to a control site that is relatively free from transportation noise. The results demonstrate the inadequacy of continuous equivalent noise level measures as indicators of night-time disturbance. Furthermore, they suggest that the use of these measures alone is likely to result in inaccurate appraisals of night-time sleep disturbance from transportation noise. Ultimately, the research implies that measurement data should be used in conjunction with subjective response data to accurately gauge the level of night-time disturbance from transportation noise.
authors.affiliation: School of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy, University College Dublin, Ireland.
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Douglas
authors.affiliation: School of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy, University College Dublin, Ireland. Electronic address: enda.murphy@ucd.ie.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Murphy
mesh_terms: D000401:Aircraft; D004781:Environmental Exposure / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D006798:Housing; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009624:Noise, Transportation / Q000009:adverse effects*; D012890:Sleep; D012893:Sleep Wake Disorders / Q000209:etiology