The Audio and Acoustic Engineering Research Centre at the University of Salford is building a sound map of the world to investigate how sounds in our everyday environment make us feel.

We’re calling people across the world to use their iphone (or any other audio recorder) to record clips of around 30 seconds in length from different sound environments, or ‘soundscapes’ from a family car journey to a busy shopping centre, and to upload them to our virtual map, along with their opinions of them and why they chose to record it.

Here is an example of an urban soundscape:

Sound Around You aims to raise awareness of how our soundscape influences us and could have far reaching implications for professions and social groups ranging from urban planners to house buyers.