Concept, Framework, and Data Model for Geographical Soundscapes

Existing concepts and frameworks of soundscapes focus on the analysis and description of the sound source but do not explore geographical environment parameters and receiver characteristics in the geographical scene. Existing soundscape data models ignore the geographical environment and receiver information, which limits the comprehensive understanding and expression of soundscapes. They cannot study the relationship between the elements related to the sound source or explore the interaction mechanism between the sound and geographical environments. From the geographical perspective, this study extends soundscape to geographical soundscape (geo-soundscape), defines geo-soundscape by the cognition of the geographical scene, analyzes and expresses the conceptual framework of soundscapes through a content hierarchy structure, and expands the characteristics of the receiver, geographical environment parameters, further-obtained geographical scene elements, and scene element description dimensions. Based on the MPEG-7 data model, this study develops a geographical-MPEG-7 data model which consists of low-, medium-, and high-level feature classes. Taking as an example soundscape data collected on a university road in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, in a real geographical environment, the concept, framework, and data model architecture of the geo-soundscape proposed in this study are demonstrated and described to validate the completeness and feasibility of the proposed model. The results show that our basic framework for a geo-soundscape is well adapted to the Geo-MPEG-7 data model. The model can store, organize, and describe all the soundscape information containing all elements and inter-element relationships. The soundscape in the real environment is fully expressed and described. This study provides a new research direction for soundscapes from a geographical perspective and provides guidance for urban planning and landscape design.