A Season for Complaints: How Does Weather Affect Noise Complaints between Neighbors?

Both the built environment and the natural environment have a physiological and psychological effect on human behavior, which potentially affects people's sensitivity and tolerance to surrounding noise and leads to annoyance, nuisance, distress, or overt actions and aggressive behaviors such as noise complaints to people living nearby. This study aims to explore the extent to which weather conditions affect the prevalence of noise complaints between neighbors mediated through the neighborhood's built environment. Using Brisbane, Australia, as a study case, we draw on a large-scale administrative dataset from 2016 to explore the monthly and seasonal variations of noise complaints between neighbors and employ a stepwise multiple regression to analyze the extent to which weather factors affect noise complaints. Our findings show that neighbors largely complain about noise made by animals, and such complaints most frequently appear in March-May, the autumn season in the Southern Hemisphere. Built environment plays a primary role in noise complaints, and culturally diverse suburbs with less green space tend to have a higher likelihood of neighbor complaints in spring and summer; such a likelihood is further increased by a higher level of wind, humidity, and temperature in a yearly time frame. However, the effect of weather on animal- and non-animal-related noise complaints in different seasons is less consistent. Our findings, to a certain degree, reveal that weather conditions may serve as a psychological moderator to change people's tolerance and sensitivity to noise, alter their routine activities and exposure to noise sources, and further affect the likelihood of noise complaints between neighbors.