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Looking for a bird's-eye view of human impact? A new study published in the journal Nature provides the most comprehensive picture yet of how human noise and light pollution affect birds throughout North America, including how these factors may interact with or mask the impacts of climate change.

Recent troubling findings suggest bird populations have declined by more than 30% in the last few decades. To develop effective strategies to reverse this trend, scientists and land managers need to understand what caused the decline.

The effects of noise and light pollution on the health of bird populations had been largely overlooked until some recent studies suggested that these stressors can harm individual species. With this new study, a continent-wide picture has emerged.

"Our study provides the most comprehensive evidence that noise and light can profoundly alter reproduction of birds, even when accounting for other aspects of human activities," said Clint Francis, a biologist at California Polytechnic State University and one of the lead study authors.