Social Media Depictions of the Impact of Noise Pollution on Communication and Mental and Physical Health

Noise pollution is known to have harmful consequences on various facets of human health, as is recognized by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as by the World Health Organization. Even though noise pollution is a ubiquitous and global problem, the public may not be cognizant of its ill-effects. Often, people go online first to obtain information, and YouTube is the second most used social media platform. For these reasons, the objective of this study was to examine the information available by YouTube to the public about parameters pertaining to noise pollution. The most viewed one-hundred videos in English were obtained for examination from YouTube, searching for "noise pollution." Each video was assessed regarding the pertinent information (content) it displayed, as well as for the date it was uploaded, the source of its upload (professional or consumer/public), the duration of the video (in seconds), number of times it was viewed, and the number of "likes" it received. Descriptive statistics, Mann-Whitney U tests, Fisher's exact tests, or Chi-square tests were applied as appropriate. Analysis of video characteristics indicated that the 100 most viewed videos on YouTube on the topic of noise pollution were uploaded from 2009 to 2023, with the highest frequency of uploads occurring in 2022 (16%), with 27% originating from the general public and 73% originating from professional health organizations. Cumulatively, the videos were viewed over 15 million times, and those uploaded by consumers had a greater median view tally (17,000), were longer in duration, and were "liked" more compared to videos uploaded by professionals (5,100). However, these differences were not statistically significant. Analysis of video content provided a breadth of data, with statistically significant differences (p < 0.05) between consumer and professional videos in their presentations of noise characteristics, discussions of official and anecdotal complaints regarding noise, health problems attributed to noise pollution, general effects of noise on the community, and reactions from community administrators. Further topics shown equally in consumer and professional videos, from tinnitus to communication difficulties are discussed. Whereas of the one hundred most viewed videos, 73 were uploaded by professionals compared to 27 uploaded by the public, the fact that the professional videos had a somewhat lower median number of views (5,100 compared to 17,000), may point to a likely preference of consumers for videos by "peers." It may be worthwhile for professional organizations to consider this tendency so as to enhance the public's accessing of curated professional videos. Concerning the content available, the findings reveal that there is a respectable professional presence on YouTube videos on noise pollution. Nonetheless, certain issues were not adequately addressed, including the significant cognitive, communication, and physical harmful effects, or possible information that could be useful to the public on noise exposure.