Rock Art Soundscapes: Perception and emotions evoked by singular acoustic spaces

eng Sound permeates our daily existence universally and timelessly, as shown by its integral role in the ritualistic practices in almost every culture worldwide. The physical characteristics of sound propagation in space can significantly influence our perception and emotional responses towards sound. Consequently, a hypothesis arises that the acoustic attributes of ritual sites may influence the emotional impact of sound on participants during rituals. Christian temples provide a tangible example, characterized by specific acoustic features such as prolonged reverberation that amalgamates sound, which Western individuals culturally associate with an approach to the divine. Rock art sites represent another intriguing case. Archaeologists theorize that the creation of rock art —paintings or engravings on rock surfaces— during prehistory was intertwined with social and ritualistic activities that incorporated sound production. However, how sound is perceived in rock art sites and, more crucially, the influence of acoustics on listeners' perceptions, is a largely unexplored field. The primary goal of this doctoral thesis was to investigate the acoustic characteristics of rock art sites, discern how listeners perceive them, explore their modulation of emotional responses to sound, and identify specific acoustic attributes distinguishing rock art sites from comparable locations lacking such features. This exploration would help to unveil the criteria that prehistoric individuals potentially employed in selecting optimal spots for their ritual activities in which rock art was an element, and whether this involved the preference of particular sites because of their sound nature. A common approach to approximate a desired acoustic environment for listeners involves capturing the acoustic print of spaces through the register of its so-called impulse response. Impulse responses compile information on sound propagation within a given space, enabling, on one hand, the acoustic analysis of the space, and on the other hand, the virtual recreation of its acoustic characteristics for presentation to listeners. Such recreation of acoustic environments receives the name of auralization. Employing this methodology, four studies were designed and implemented, that involved presenting listeners with a series of auralizations of Christian temples, in the first study, and rock art sites, in the subsequent three studies. Additionally, subjective impressions of listeners were gathered through a series of behavioral scales in the first two studies and via sensory profiling methods in the latter two studies. In the first two studies, listeners' perception of auralizations was evaluated using a set of bipolar Likert scales. The first study involved the recreation of the acoustics of Christian temples of the United Kingdom, combining their impulse responses with musical pieces from the Renaissance. The outcomes indicated that the acoustic attributes of Christian temples elicited a stronger sense of transcendence but diminished feelings of tenderness and expressiveness when compared to drier acoustics characterized by shorter reverberation. In the second study, a series of auralizations of rock art sites from the Altai region of Russian Siberia were presented to listeners, combining captured impulse responses from the sites with various sounds from natural sources. The findings demonstrated that listeners perceived the sounds as closer, more present, and more tension-evoking when paired with the acoustics of certain rock art sites, as opposed to auralizations of locations with similar characteristics but lacking rock art features. In the third and fourth studies, we moved from employing pre-selected Likert scales to adopting a sensory profiling method, wherein listeners were asked to provide their own descriptions of the presented auralizations. In the third study, we examined perceived differences between two rock art sites in the southern mountains of Cádiz, Spain. The acoustics of these sites were combined with various sounds, including speech, singing voices, and musical instruments. Listeners perceived significant differences in the acoustics of the two sites in the dimensions of echo, distance from the sound source, resonance, clarity, and envelopment. In the fourth study, listeners were presented with auralizations of a series of rock art sites in the province of Valencia, Spain. These auralizations combined captured impulse responses with sounds of singing voices and drums. Results unveiled that the acoustic recreations of the rock art sites were perceived as significantly bigger, wider, more reverberant, farther, and less direct compared to their counterparts, i.e, the auralizations of locations with similar physical characteristics but devoid of rock art. Overall, the findings of this doctoral thesis indicate that the acoustic attributes of natural landscapes may have influenced the selection process of rock art sites in prehistoric contexts. Differences were identified in both the acoustics and the perceived auditory experience when comparing rock art sites to other locations lacking rock art. However, it is noteworthy that the acoustic features characterizing the studied rock art sites and listeners' perceptions thereof were not uniform across the various studies conducted, each of them focusing on a different rock art landscape. It is posited that the intended activities at the site and the sounds to be produced may have played a pivotal role in the selection process. Reverberation emerged as a primary acoustic feature explaining most of the outcomes across the studies. Notably, the dimension of perception most prominently influenced by the acoustics of rock art sites, consistently observed across the studies, was the perceived distance from the sound source. In summary, this doctoral thesis contributes significantly to our comprehension of how acoustics influenced the selection of rock art sites in prehistory, highlighting the crucial significance of reverberation. Furthermore, it demonstrates the efficacy of employing auralization and sensory profiling methods in investigating listeners' responses to the acoustics of rock art sites.