After speaking with Sue Thomas last week, she suggested that I get in contact with some sound experts to access the most suitable and effective natural soundscapes to implement in my upcoming immersive event at Chelsea College of Arts.
Natural Soundscapes:
Consequently, I have contacted Cheryl Tipps at the British Libary, as well as Radio Lento in regards to collaborating on curating natural soundscapes for the event. I am very hopeful one of these parties will respond, as Sue mentioned that the British Libary, in particular, is often keen to collaborate on these types of projects so that the soundscapes get utilised.
Body Metrics for Measuring Connection to Nature:
Additionally, raised in multiple meetings with experts over the coming weeks and my panel discussion was to explore measuring body metrics such as blood pressure, oxygen levels or plus to see the impacts of the natural events or experience on customers connection to nature.
Subsequently, I have contact medical supply companies and medical experts to see if any would be interested in supplying the medical technology to the vent or be interested in attending/ helping to run it and collaborating on it.
In my research on utilising body metrics to measure connections, I have found that studies that have done this so far are predominately US-based. Therefore, conducting a body metrics examination of interactions with nature in the UK could be of vast benefit.
Reflection:
I am really keen to utilise a different type of measure for connection to nature in my next event to create variety in the type of data and feedback gained from my interventions. Therefore, I feel it would be really interesting to gather body metric data that can empirically show the impact of natural design upon customers in hospitality spaces. However, measuring body metrics requires either buying or renting medical equiptment to measure these statistics or collaborating with a medical supply company or professional to obtain them. Ideally, I would like to collaborate with a medical professional so they could also attend the vent and be in charge of taking the measurements so that I can ensure they are all scientifically accurate. I realise it may be very difficult to get someone to fit this role and so I am flexible in either possibly taking the measurements myself or resorting to a different measuring method. I will explore possible different methods of measurement in upcoming posts.
In relation to soundscapes, I feel it will add a great depth and dimension to the event if I am able to collaborate to create unique soundscapes for the event. Also, if I am able to collaborate on soundscapes I could create another soundscape to utilise in a future cafe intervention to test of the responses to sound alone, or sound combined with scents.
References
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4917833/
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02942/full