Believe what you hear, not what you see: vision interferes with auditory route guidance in complex environment

Authors:
Ying Wang;Huiting Zhang;Lu Yu;Kan Zhang;Xianghong Sun;Thomas Plocher
Affiliations:
Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China;Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China;Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China;Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China;Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China;Honeywell Labs, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Venue:
HCII'11 Proceedings of the 14th international conference on Human-computer interaction: towards mobile and intelligent interaction environments - Volume Part III
Year:
2011

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Abstract

Auditory route guidance has a potential use for sighted people who have to conduct emergent real-world task during navigation. Despite its affordance in assisting people in the absence of vision, it may receive interference from vision under normal visual condition. The present study tested the effect of vision on auditory route guidance using different display modes. Normalsighted firefighters were instructed to navigate within a virtual building following auditory commands from a navigation aid, either under normal (high-visibility) or smoked (low-visibility) visual condition. Navigation in normal visual condition was faster but less accurate than that under low-visibility, and was characterized by unique walking patterns. Moreover, it resulted in worse spatial memory and less positive experience toward the system. These results suggest that the interaction mode of human and auditory route guidance system could be modified by vision. Clear visual inputs boost risk-taking behaviors in route following, which might lead to dangerous consequence in specific navigation tasks. Furthermore, the interference from vision was not restricted to specific display mode, indicating that it might be a general problem for auditory route guidance. As a challenging and primary human factor issue, it should attract more attention and caution in future research and design work.