Exploring the Link Between Building Acoustics, Health and Wellbeing

February 7, 2022

How a building looks is important – but how does a building make you feel when you’re inside?

University of Toronto Scarborough Campus' Environmental Science and Chemistry Building,Toronto,ON,Canada,11779 m²,Diamond Schmitt Architects,University of Toronto,Nelmar Drywall Company Ltd.,Patene Building Supplies,LEED Gold,Bochsler Creative,ROCKFON Alaska,ROCKFON Artic,SLP-edge,SQ-edge,2x5,2x4,white,1200
In a space with no acoustic treatment, the tails of some of the words start to run into the fronts of the other words and it really muddies the speech intelligibility. Effectively, if you can’t hear, you can’t learn – particularly for children. They don’t have the linguistic skills to be able to fill in the blanks like adults do. By missing those key concepts, they have a hard time learning.

Amanda Robinson

Co-CEO of the global consultancy Marshall Day Acoustics and member of the IWBI Sound Advisory Committee
Office building Parallel, Oslo. WELL building standard.