EditorialData sonification and sound design in interactive systems
Introduction
Sound is an intrinsic component of most human interactions with objects and compound systems. In everyday life we use audio clues produced naturally in interactions, usually together with other aspects (haptic, visual, etc.), to make sense of a system and our relation to it in terms of information and emotions.
New technology-based interactive systems do not automatically come equipped with a sound production component (nor with appropriate haptic and visual characteristics). A lack of such feedback components can produce unnatural and inadequate interactions with such systems. This limits their usefulness and could even be detrimental to users. Consequently suitable sound components need to be designed, mapped, integrated and tested in these new systems.
Sound is key in interaction, but it is also a very elusive aspect of it. Even though it has been shown that there are several limitations to humans׳ ability to perceive source characteristics solely based on sound, we can also say that we are very skilled in using sound as an indicator of how well an interaction is going. On the other hand, we are not always aware that we are gaining information about the system through sound nor how, and through what perceptual mechanisms, we are doing so.
The elusiveness of sound in interactions, our limited knowledge of sound perception and cognition of complex sounds in multimodal scenarios, and the difficulty in comprehensively testing such complex scenarios, has made the analysis of how sound works in interactive systems a highly challenging task. As a consequence, synthesising new meaningful sounds for interactive systems is even more arduous.
This special issue brings together a number of recent studies that highlight some of the most interesting approaches and applications in this field. Significant progress has been made along the road of understanding the role of sound in interactive systems over the last 25 years. Though it is clear that the journey is still long, we hope that this special issue will contribute to synthesise the current state of the field and focus the attentions of interested researchers on new exciting directions.
Section snippets
Background
Sound design is the overall field of research that studies how sound can be produced in such a way that its form and function are both appropriate for the system it represents, its context and the user (Susini et al., 2014). Patrick Susini, Head of the Sound Perception and Design group at IRCAM, Paris, summarises the definition of sound design in an effective way: ‘Sound design: the process of making intentions audible’.
Sonification (Kramer, 1994) can be considered a sub-type of sound design in
This special issue
This special issue was conceived to contribute to the effort of drawing together robust studies that advance our knowledge of how sound works in interactive systems across a number of different application areas (with a special interest in health and the environment).
For papers explicitly related to an application area different from audio, at least one expert reviewer from that application area was sought to provide feedback on the paper. We received a total of 27 submissions and 8 passed the
Future directions
We identified three common themes in this issue that indicate of how the field is growing and may influence future research:
- 1)
A significant interest in complex and continuous audio feedback;
- 2)
An increased research focus on the user׳s perception and understanding of the sound design output;
- 3)
A growing interest in multimodality: in particular on the relationship between audio and haptics.
We hope that this issue will contribute to the advancement of knowledge in this area and that it will be of
Acknowledgements
Twenty seven submissions were received in response to the call for papers for this special issue. Forty reviewers examined the papers and provided comments and feedback to authors. A number of these reviewers examined two or more papers. We hope that this feedback was helpful for all of the submitted papers, as it would make possible revision and other opportunities for publication.
We are very grateful to all reviewers for their very thorough work and commitment. Without their generous
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Interaction by ear
2019, International Journal of Human Computer StudiesCitation Excerpt :With data growing bigger and bigger, scientists look for new and more effective ways to make information perceivable by the limited human senses. Sound is certainly an important channel, especially for those data that are inherently temporal, as in seismology (Pat et al., 2016), but it becomes particularly effective when data sonification is combined with interactive exploration (Pauletto et al., 2016; Pauletto and Hunt, 2009). It has been noted that, in complex immersive environments for data exploration (Thompson et al., 2009), it is the process of making the artificial world that elicits the deeper exploration and understanding of large data sets.
Embodied sound design
2018, International Journal of Human Computer StudiesCitation Excerpt :Ultimately, comprehending the rich dynamics of embodied sketching is crucial for the development of appropriate technological systems that can support non-verbal displays in conceptual design (Eris et al., 2014; Visser and Maher, 2011). Within these premises, this contribution tackles the specific domain of sound design, that is the creative process of making sonic intentions audible (Franinović and Serafin, 2013; Pauletto et al., 2016; Susini et al., 2014). This definition applies in many different contexts, ranging from industrial products to computer games, where the sound designer is called to give objects a “voice”, or a specific audible character, sometimes following function (as in the sound for an electric car engine), sometimes following form (as in audiovisual composition) (Susini et al., 2014).”
Understanding cancer patient cohorts in virtual reality environment for better clinical decisions: a usability study
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