Community Noise Lab at BU

We are so pleased to announce our new research and creative projects to be launched in the next few months. Some of these projects are reinventions of our current work, while others are completely new. Our newest endeavor, Community Noise Lab, is housed within the Department of Environmental Health at the Boston University School of Public Health. Our research lab was generously funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Pioneering Ideas grant. Our lab is devoted to taking a more nuanced and creative inquiry into the relationship between community sound and noise issues and corresponding health impacts—both physical and mental, and both positive and negative. Our research approach is centered on a community-identified noise issue, which we investigate using real-time sound monitoring, innovative citizen-science tools, accessible visualizations, laboratory experiments, and community engagement events. With community support, we leverage these data to understand noise issues, to investigate their impacts on community health, and to provide solutions. We aim to bring about a more equitable and just community soundscape.

We are currently working with three communities in the Greater Boston Area and are teaming up with Mission Hill Health Movement as our community partner. In the next few weeks we will be releasing more information about our upcoming lab projects, new staff members, new research collaborators AND a new website, so stay tuned! If you are interested in receiving an official launch email, you can sign up here.