Developing an integrated and collective approach to digital audio entertainment and wellbeing: A semi-systematic literature review

Purpose: This literature review aims to demonstrate how everyday engagements with music streaming, podcasts, audiobooks and other digital sonic media can influence personal wellbeing. Methodology: A semi-systematic literature review was conducted using 11 online scholarly databases that produced 50 articles. The PRISMA checklist, the RAMESES publication standards for meta-narrative reviews, and the Standards for Reporting Qualitative Research guided the exploration. A two-stage approach was deployed: literature scoping using a systematic search of the databases, and a literature review guided by a strategic selection process. Findings: Key concepts were identified, coded, and grouped into themes: mood management; solitude; interaction; relationships; community; identity work; mastery; escapism; wonder; platformisation; and commercialisation. Research implications: The review shows that engagement with digital audio entertainment is personalised and complex, resulting in soundscapes that function as wellbeing technologies to support hedonic and eudaimonic wellbeing. Social implications: Findings illustrate how digital audio entertainment can be used as a cultural intervention to support wellbeing in everyday life. Originality: The review develops an integrated and collective approach to digital audio entertainment and wellbeing that is inclusive of multiple digital audio forms, genres and platforms, and therefore representative of everyday media use in a polymediated society.