Photo: Suvi Kivimaa/Studio Torkkeli
This doctoral dissertation investigated whether listening repeatedly to natural sounds indoors helps people recover mentally from everyday demands. It found that natural sounds produced the strongest immediate restorative effects compared to silence or common indoor activities, and that these benefits carried over and accumulated across days, even as momentary effects slightly decreased. The findings are important because they show that simple sound-based interventions can support both recovery from stress and the restoration of attention in real-life settings. This suggests that people who spend long hours indoors, such as students and healthcare professionals, could benefit from an easy, low-cost way to improve their psychological functioning by regularly listening to natural sounds.
The doctoral dissertation by Yasushi Suko (Master of Environmental Studies) in the field of Psychology titled The Cumulative Restorative Effects of Repeated Listening to Natural Sounds Indoors will be publicly examined at the Faculty of Social Sciences/Psychology at Tampere University on June 26, 2026.
The Opponent will be Professor Kathryn Williams from the University of Melbourne, Australia. The Custos will be Professor Emeritus Kalevi Korpela, Faculty of Social Sciences/Psychology, Tampere University.