A New Class of Auditory Warning Signals for Complex Systems: Auditory Icons

摘要

This simulator-based study examined conventional auditory warnings (tonal, non- verbal sounds) and auditory icons (representational, nonverbal sounds), alone and in combination with a dash-mounted visual display, to present information about impending collision situations to commercial motor vehicle operators. Brake response times were measured for impending front-to-rear collision sce- narios under 6 display configurations, 2 vehicle speeds, and 2 levels of headway Accident occurrence was measured for impending side collision scenarios under 2 vehicle speeds, 2 levels of visual workload, 2 auditory displays, absence/pres- ence of mirrors, and absence/presence of a dash-mounted iconic visual display For both front-to-rear and side collision scenarios, auditory icons elicited signih- cantly improved driver performance over conventional auditory warnings. Driver performance improved when collision warning information was presented through multiple modalities. Brake response times were significantly faster fOr impending front-to-rear collision scenarios using the longer headway condition. The presence of mirrors significantly reduced the number of accidents for impending side collision scenarios. Subjective preference data indicated that par- ticipants preferred multimodal displays over single-modality displays. Actual or potential applications for this research include auditory displays and warnings, information presentation, and the development of alternative user interfaces.