DISSERTATION RESEARCH
Complex Auditory Displays
As the devices we surround ourselves with become increasingly more advanced, and an abundance of information is continuously available to us, the amount of visuals and screen real estate available to users remain finite. In many cases screens on our devices have gotten smaller or have even become nonexistent. Conversely, the audio capabilities on many of our devices have seen great improvements over the past few years. So, it's not a surprise that designers and developers are taking advantage of audio and other non-visual or multimodal means for presenting information to users.
This leads us to a usability question - How many sounds can listeners utilize at a given time before becoming confused or overburdened?
In the realm of auditory perception research and psychoacoustics this has been
discussed in terms of how many acoustic streams (think information streams) a listener can utilize. The answer to this can vary greatly depending on a variety of factors.
The relationship between listeners, their data sources, and the auditory display, creates an iterative process that continuously evolves through feedback, experience, and adapting ways that people interact with systems.
The focus of my academic work at the Georgia Institute of Technology has centered
around determining perceptual bottlenecks that account for loss of information or
comprehension of that information in complex auditory displays, as well as
determining the best practices for overcoming these limitations.
*Winner of Best Paper Award at the 9th Audio Mostly conference in Aalborg, Denmark