Only 15.4% of Cypriots in 2019 complained about the acoustic pollution – annoying noise from neighbouring apartments and houses, as well as from the streets. Eurostat notes that this is the lowest level of dissatisfaction in the ten years during which such a study has been conducted.
If in 2010, the acoustic discomfort experienced by 29% of Cypriots surveyed, by 2017, the proportion of complainants decreased to 17.2%, and two years later – to 15.4%. Note that in 2019 the EU average was 17.3%.
Malta complained most often about noise in 2019 (28.3%), while in the Netherlands and Germany a quarter of the population was dissatisfied. The quietest – or the highest tolerance of citizens to noise – in Slovakia (10.2%), Hungary (9.7%) and Bulgaria (8.9%).
Logically, urban residents complain about noise much more often than the rural population – 24.1% vs. 10.4%. In addition, the researchers note that the more people in the family of respondents, the less they tend to notice unnecessary sounds and get annoyed. Thus, across the EU as a whole, 20.8% of lone respondents, 17.8% of families of two adults and 15.5% of families with three or more members expressed dissatisfaction with noise.