Urban noise-induced stress and decision-making: effects of high-intensity acoustic exposure on risk-based and...

Urban noise is one of the most pervasive environmental stressors in Latin American cities, yet its specific effects on complex cognitive processes such as decision-making remain insufficiently studied. This study examined the effects of acute exposure to high-intensity urban noise (85-95 dB[A]) on risk-based and intertemporal decision-making in healthy adults under controlled laboratory conditions, while characterizing the autonomic and subjective stress response and exploring its relationship with cognitive performance.

A quasi-experimental between-groups design was employed with N = 134 university students (Experimental Group n = 56; Control Group n = 78), equivalent in age, sex, years of schooling, baseline heart rate, and perceived stress. Participants completed the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) and the Monetary Choice Questionnaire (MCQ) under noise or silence conditions. Heart rate was recorded at six time points across the protocol, and perceived stress was assessed using the PSS-14 and a visual analogue scale.

The Experimental Group showed significantly elevated heart rate across all experimental phases (d = 2.50 for ΔHR) and markedly higher post-task stress perception (r = 0.856), confirming the efficacy of the experimental manipulation. However, no significant between-group differences were found in IGT performance or MCQ delay discounting parameter log(k), a pattern that remained after controlling for baseline physiological and psychological variables (ANCOVA) and was confirmed by mediation analyses showing that ΔHR did not mediate the relationship between experimental condition and decision-making performance.

These findings reveal a systematic dissociation between physiological stress activation and cognitive performance, suggesting that autonomic sympathetic arousal induced by urban noise is not a sufficient condition to impair prefrontal-dependent decision-making processes under acute exposure conditions.