where it might be hard to design in window views or grow plants, such as basements. We are also better able to concentrate in spaces featuring wood. Wood ceilings may encourage people to fall asleep more quickly if light bounces off of them. However, it’s best if no more than 45 percent of the surfaces in an area are covered with wood. With this amount of wood on view, we’re most comfortable and relaxed.
Matte finishes are more relaxing for us to look at than shiny ones, and many natural materials can readily be used with or without a shine.
Matte finishes are more relaxing than shiny ones.
Stones, for example, can be polished or not as desired. So can many styles of tiles and other surface materials. Shiny finishes are, however, preferred over matte finishes.
Information on which materials and finishes off-gas dangerous materials is continually being updated as more related research is done and as new surfaces come onto the market. Visit reliable online data sources, such as the websites of the American Institute of Architects, the American Society of Interior Designers, or the International Interior Design Association for the latest news on healthy materials.
Audio Experiences
Just as professionals travel around with light meters so they can determine how bright a light is, they also have monitors that let them know how loud it is in a space. When sound levels in workplaces get to around forty-five decibels (dB), our lives start to degrade, and, in more public, social situations, the magic volume level that divides happy from stressed listeners is around sixty decibels. How loud is that? The loudness of a whisper or of gently rustling leaves is twenty dB, the sound level in a quiet library is about thirty dB, and that of a quiet room or busier library is forty dB. Forty-five dB is about as loud as a conversation between two people generally gets. The loudness of an alarm clock is eighty dB.
You can influence the soundscapes in your home and workplace by playing music or birdsongs (more on this below) or via rules about who is allowed to talk when. Other soundscape modifications require professionals—for example, adding sound blocking insulation to walls or using acoustic ceiling tiles.
Anything that’s relevant or potentially relevant to what we’re doing is a distracting noise, and since speech can at any time become relevant, it needs to be monitored and is particularly distracting. Meaningful noise degrades cognitive performance.
Sometimes people are told to ignore people around them who are talking or other uncontrollable sounds, such as water dripping. But humans can’t do that—no matter how hard we try. This also seems to be tied to our experiences as a young species, when ignoring others or ignoring a noise might have made us some other creature’s lunch. Since we can’t ignore conversations around us, it can be particularly important to acoustically isolate offices, bedrooms, home spas, and similar areas by placing them at a distance from noisier zones or adding sound insulating materials to the walls around them. Walls that reach to the lower level of the floor above are much more effective at blocking sounds than walls that reach only to a dropped ceiling. The space between a dropped ceiling and the true ceiling in an area is a sound superhighway, a zone that makes a nearly whispered conversation instantly known to all. To effectively manage sound, it’s important to understand when there’s a gap between a true ceiling and a dropped ceiling and block it. Echoes have particularly negative effects on our cognitive performance and social behavior; soft surfaces such as rugs and wall hangings can help keep them in check.
It is not your imagination; random noises (as opposed to continuous or predictable ones) really are the most annoying. If a leaky faucet starts to drip intermittently, you need to stop the noise, even if by just putting a face cloth where the water hits the sink. You cannot ignore the sound or “not let it bother you.” Any random unpredictable sounds in your house or office need to be acoustically isolated so that they don’t destroy the atmosphere you’re trying to create. Make sure, for example, that you can’t hear the printer that springs randomly into action. It can be worth the costs to invest in heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems that don’t make unpredictable, distressing noises or to install sound absorbing materials in and around hobby spaces where people will operate power tools.
The fact that most of us can’t just turn off our ears also means that we need to add background noise to a space where we want to feel good and think clearly. Research has linked particular attributes of sounds with certain mental states. High-pitched sounds (for example, violins) set our nerves on edge, while ones that are lower in pitch, like a guitar, relax us. Music in a major key boosts our mood, while music in minor keys has the opposite effect.
Our hearts beat in time to the soundscape we’re in, and changing the pace at which our hearts are beating is integral to influencing our mood. Faster sounds, whether music or otherwise, energize us, while slower ones calm us. Fast-paced music in a major key makes us feel high in energy and in a good mood, while slower music in a minor key has the opposite effect. We even walk faster when we hear music with more beats per minute. Relaxing music has between 50 and 70 beats per minute, and very relaxing songs like lullabies have 30 to 50 or so beats per minute. Songs with 100 to 130 beats per minute energize us. Not sure how many beats per minute are in the music you enjoy? Google “beats per minute” to find one of the websites that provides exactly this sort of information.
People’s brains do their best knowledge-type work when they’re in a space where the noise has been cut to a quiet background hum that reminds them they’re not the last person on the planet but the words other people are saying aren’t clear or loud enough to be understood; this is similar to a relatively quiet office while wearing headphones but not listening to music or anything else through them.
White noise blocks distracting background sounds, while pink noise calms us. Examples of each of these kinds of noise are available online at Wikipedia, and each can be added to a space via online services, as well. White noise has been shown to boost our cognitive performance compared to how well our brains usually work when listening to office type noise.
If white or pink noise, which get their names because of the patterns in their sound waves, seem a little institutional to you, there are other options. It’s psychologically better to listen to music you like than music you don’t like, but if the people who use a space have very different music preferences, go with classical, nonvocal music, as it’s universally positively—well, or at least not negatively—received. Scientists have also learned that when we hear the sorts of birdcalls, gentle water movements, and rustling wind noises found in a temperate zone meadow on a lovely spring day, we immediately feel calmer. These sounds also help us restock our mental processing power after we’ve depleted it doing knowledge work. Playing nature sounds may sound silly, but it’s proven effective in a range of spaces, from doctor’s waiting rooms to workplaces to living rooms. Restful and rejuvenating meadow soundtracks are available online.
Don’t try to create a place that’s completely quiet or quieter than we’d expect—that’s just as unnerving to humans as one that’s too noisy. Concentrate instead on having the right sorts of sounds fill a space, the ones that help you create desired moods.
The soundscape in your home can, and should, be actively managed. What sounds do you like to hear? Birds singing? Street vendors from Marrakesh? Mozart? The sounds outside your home? Are you one of the few people who isn’t driven crazy by the sound of wind chimes? Set up a sound system so you can listen to what you enjoy hearing when you’re hanging around at home. Modify your soundscapes so that being inside your home is a different experience in the morning, afternoon, and evening, and at different times of the year.
Scents
Rigorous scientific research has linked particular scents to certain psychological states. It
