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Understanding Auditory Navigation to Physical Landmarks

  • Conference paper

Part of the Lecture Notes in Computer Science book series (LNISA,volume 7468)

Abstract

We present two studies that seek to better understand the role spatialised (3D) audio can play in supporting effective pedestrian navigation. 24 participants attempted to navigate and locate physical landmarks in a local botanical gardens using a gpsTunes [1] based auditory navigation system coupled with a map. Participants were significantly better at locating prominent than non-prominent physical landmarks. However, no significant quantative difference was found between the use of a map only and map + audio. Qualitative analysis revealed significant issues when physical landmarks are used, and common strategies when combining audio and map navigation. We highlight the implications of these in relation to existing work, and provide guidelines for future designers to employ.

Keywords

  • 3D Audio
  • Pedestrian Navigation
  • Maps
  • Landmarks

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© 2012 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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McGookin, D., Brewster, S.A. (2012). Understanding Auditory Navigation to Physical Landmarks. In: Magnusson, C., Szymczak, D., Brewster, S. (eds) Haptic and Audio Interaction Design. HAID 2012. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 7468. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-32796-4_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-32796-4_1

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-32795-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-32796-4

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)