A new study found that people who were exposed to even moderate levels of aircraft noise were less likely to get the minimum recommended amount of sleep each night, and this risk was increased among people living in the western US. ., near a major cargo airport or near a large body of water, and among people without hearing loss.
As major airline officials predict another record-breaking summer air travel season, a new analysis by the Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) and Oregon State University found that exposure to even moderate levels of Aircraft noise can disrupt sleep, building on a growing body of research on the harmful health effects of environmental noise.
published in magazine Environmental Health Perspectives, the study found that people who were exposed to aircraft noise at levels as low as 45 dB were more likely to get less than 7 hours of sleep a night. For comparison, the sound of a whisper is 30 dB, a library setting is 40 dB, and a typical home conversation is 50 dB.
Sleep is essential for general health and well-being, including daily physical and mental functioning, and a lack of adequate sleep can increase the risks of cardiovascular disease, depression, diabetes, cancer, and many other health conditions. Health experts state that most adults need seven to nine hours of sleep each night for healthy functioning.
This study is the first large-scale analysis of aircraft noise and sleep duration that explains the detrimental effects of multiple environmental exposures in communities, such as vegetation and night light (LAN).
Despite how common aircraft noise exposure is for many people, little is known about the health effects of aircraft noise, particularly in the US, according to the study’s lead author, Matthew Bozigar. , assistant professor of epidemiology at OSU, and the study’s lead author, Junenette Peters. , BUSPH associate professor of environmental health.
“This study helps us understand potential health pathways through which aircraft noise may act, such as through disrupted sleep,” says Peters.
For the study, Dr. Peters, Dr. Bozigar, and colleagues from BUSPH, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health examined aircraft noise exposure and self-reported sleep disturbances among more of 35,000 participants living around 90 major US airports. Participants were drawn from the Nurses’ Health Study (NHS), an ongoing prospective study of US nurses completing biennial questionnaires since 1976.
The team examined aircraft noise levels every five years from 1995 to 2015, focusing on two measures: a nighttime estimate (Lnight) that captures aircraft noise that occurs when people are sleeping, and a day-night estimate. (DNL) which captures the average noise level over a 24-hour period and applies a 10 dB adjustment for aircraft noise at night when background noise is low. DNL is also the primary metric the FAA uses for aircraft noise policies, and the threshold for significant noise impacts is 65 dB above DNL. The team linked these multi-threshold measures to the geocoded home addresses of the nurses.
After accounting for a variety of factors, including demographics, health behaviors, comorbidities, and environmental exposures such as vegetation and night light (LAN), the results showed that the odds of getting less than seven hours of sleep increased as exposure to aircraft noise increased.
Short sleep duration was also more likely among nurses who lived on the West Coast, near a major cargo airport or a large body of water, as well as among nurses who did not report hearing loss.
“We found surprisingly strong relationships for particular subgroups that we are still trying to understand,” says Bozigar. “For example, there was a relatively strong signal between aircraft noise and both dimensions of interrupted sleep, short sleep, and poor sleep quality near major cargo airports. There is likely more to this story, as that cargo operations tend to use older, heavily loaded, and therefore noisier aircraft that often fly during night hours, and the amount of cargo shipped by air has increased steadily over the past two decades. , possibly related to increased e-commerce. If the trends continue, it could mean more impacts from aircraft noise on more groups of people.”
While the results suggested a clear link between aircraft noise and sleep duration, the researchers did not see a consistent association between aircraft noise and sleep quality.
“While we can’t recommend policy changes based on the results of a single study, our study of 90 US airports revealed a connection between aircraft noise and getting less than the recommended amount of sleep,” says Dr. Bozigar. “Current knowledge gaps could be filled in the future by including additional demographic groups, such as boys, men, minority groups, and more detailed aircraft noise metrics rather than a nightly or 24-hour average in studies. They also There are more detailed ways to measure sleep than self-reports, such as wearable activity monitors like a Fitbit, which researchers are incorporating more often into studies of cars and trains, to determine the impact of each type on health.” .
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