A preliminary review of literatures focusing on the neighborhood noise issue in Japan

抄録

Further urbanization in Japan has led to a new ‘kinrin souon’ problem, which means neighborhood noise issue within and among communities. The purpose of this study was to review the Japanese literatures that focused on neighborhood noise issues, and to clarify what kinds of research have already been done in this field. To conduct this systematic review, the researcher utilized three databases—namely, the Japanese Central Review of Medicine, Cinii Articles, and the National Diet Library-Online Public Catalog Access. The keyword used for this study was “kinrin souon” in the Japanese language, which literally translates to “neighborhood noise”. From the extant published work, 23 literatures were selected for this thematic analysis. Analyzing the secular change of the literature, approximately 50% were published after the 1980s. Lack of communication among neighbors negatively affected how they perceived the loudness of daily sounds. Having a tight and harmonious relationship among neighbors actually reduced the negative perception of daily noise. Considering the effects of urbanization, the neighborhood noise issue has become unavoidable for people living in many communities and local governments in urban areas. Some cases of neighborhood noise would need further assistance from the local government to resolve the issue because of weak community relations among its citizens. The issue includes not only the loudness of the noises but also the emotional conflicts between and among neighbors. The keys to solving this problem are improvement of living conditions and improvement of neighbor relations among community members.