Can spa­tial audi­tory cues enable us to remain ori­ented while nav­i­gat­ing real or vir­tual environments?

Non-visual nav­i­ga­tion inter­faces are cru­cial for the blind, who suffer great reduc­tions in mobil­ity because of the dif­fi­culty of nav­i­gat­ing new envi­ron­ments. Sighted users may also ben­e­fit from these types of dis­plays when they are nav­i­gat­ing but can’t see the screen of their mobile device because they are using their hands for some­thing else (e.g. cycling). We are inves­ti­gat­ing the psy­cho­log­i­cal fac­tors that underly audi­tory dis­plays, and build­ing off of pre­vi­ous work to design new audi­tory dis­plays for navigation.

Publications