Stop, What's that sound? Everybody look, what's going down?

[Ara D.]

 Has any one ever figured out the rough distance a player can hear sounds on the overland map. When I'm trekking along and I hear a wolf howl is that ambience or are there wolves near by, and how near do you think?

[PALU]

I've always assumed it means they are in the vicinity. However, I also expect the howls to carry quite far.

[ineedcords]

Has any one ever figured out the rough distance a player can hear sounds on the overland map. When I'm trekking along and I hear a wolf howl is that ambience or are there wolves near by, and how near do you think?

In game:
If each howling wolf is actually a live entity in the savegame file perhaps a curious mind can check the distance between player character position and nearest wolf (or wolf pack) object. I am not sure if that is the case and thus whether it is possible to study this aspect, without having access to the game's source code...
Alternatively you might get lucky if Sami or Erkka take an interest in this & reply here with their knowledge.

In real life:
Not your question but I was curious, looks like, based on this source, in ideal conditions, about 10 mile seems to be the consensus: https://www.quora.com/How-far-does-a-wolfs-howl-travel?share=1