INVESTIGATION ON THE SOUNDSCAPE PREFERENCE AND PERCEPTION OF HIGHLANDS ENVIRONMENT: A PRELIMINARY STUDY

Highland environment is one of the popular tourist destinations because it holds a rich array of natural resources. However, the economic and development growth of highlands gave potential effect of biological wealth and environment surrounding. Noise pollution in developing highland area could intrude the ability to comprehend of natural and environmental sounds. As preliminary, the main objective of this research is to identify factors and elements that characterise the soundscape in three selected green areas on highland environment. The research was carried out through a series of field measurement and audio-visual experiment. At the first stage of the study, the assessment of environmental sounds in three selected landscape areas was conducted. The assessment parameter of L Aeq, 8h was taken in daytime for six days. The results ascertained that the all selected landscape areas of highland environment is dominated by sound of vehicle. Next, a series of audio-visual test is conducted where subjects listen to original recorded and combination of several stimuli sound samples to examine the preference and perception of acoustic comfort in selected green areas. In results shown that the natural ambient sound elements for combination stimuli sounds attributed more attention on preference and perception of the soundscape in highland environment.