Place Meaning and the Visually Impaired: The Impact of Sound Parameters on Place Attachment and Identity

This paper outlines some theoretical considerations regarding the concept of place meaning as applied to populations of visually impaired users of mobile location-based applications. The concept of place meaning and its constituent elements, place attachment and place identity, are explored in detail and a research design on place meaning for visually impaired smartphone users is outlined as a first step toward the systematic investigation of the differences in the creation of place attachment and place identity between sighted and visually impaired individuals as a result of auditory stimuli emerging from the urban soundscape.