The Relationship between Office Soundscape and User Experience

Is banishing sound the way forward?

A popular notion amongst many people is that noise must be completely eradicated in order to achieve a work environment that is free from distractions. However, this view is not entirely true. The preference for a certain sound environment depends on the type of activity that a particular individual is performing. For instance, people prefer a certain level of background noise when carrying out unchallenging tasks. However, silence is usually preferred when trying to meet deadlines and performing tasks that require a lot of reading and problem solving. Besides, many people do not have an issue with noise arising from conversations, footsteps and mechanical sounds (e.g. ventilation noise, keyboard/mouse clicks) which are amongst the major sources of noise within an office. In many instances, keyboard and mouse clicks can motivate employees to keep on working since everyone else around them are working. Furthermore, ventilation noise can provide a certain level of sound masking to reduce the level of noise coming from varying sources and thereby ensure that productivity and concentration levels are not affected.

The importance of materiality

Materiality plays a vital role in absorbing and isolating sound. Current research stresses the need for soft screens and partitions between desks in an open plan workspace to absorb sound. Given that human speech is directional, the presence of these at a minimum height of 1500mm should weaken the noise and prevent it from being directional. Screens aside, the floor and ceiling surfaces should be absorbent too. Current standards necessitate the latter to be no higher than 3000mm to ensure that the office environment does not become echoey whereas the former shall be carpeted to absorb the noise of footsteps (BSI, 2014).

What about design?

Collaboration necessitates the need for an open-plan work environment. Such spaces, however, may not be appropriate for meetings and conversations which require a high level of privacy. On the other hand, noise coming from kitchenettes and breakout spaces can often distract individuals that are performing important tasks. To solve these issues, the design of a particular workspace needs to be divided into different zones with appropriate sound insulation between them to ensure noise does not creep into a space that demands high levels of productivity and concentration. In addition to zoning, private pods should be provided as these do not take up a lot of space and thereby, a multitude of them can be provided which can be used by people occasionally to escape the noisy office soundscape and more importantly, use them for important meetings and conversations.

This blog has been created by Tasawar Rahim. IMA Architects. Leicester Architects. Commercial Architects. BIM experts.