An evaluation of earcons for use in auditory human-computer interfaces

An evaluation of earcons was carried out to see whether they are an effective means of communicating information in sound. An initial experiment showed that earcons were better than unstructured bursts of sound and that musical timbres were more effective than simple tones. A second experiment was then carried out which improved upon some of the weaknesses shown up in Experiment 1 to give a significant improvement in recognition. From the results of these experiments some guidelines were drawn up for use in the creation of earcons. Earcons have been shown to be an effective method for communicating information in a human-computer interface. Providing information in an auditory form could generally help solve this problem and allow visually disabled users the same facilities as the sighted. This evaluation is part of a research project looking at the best ways to integrate audio and graphical interfaces. The research aims to find the areas in an interface where the use of sound will be...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 1993
• Where: CHI
• Authors: Stephen A. Brewster, Peter C. Wright, Alistair D. N. Edwards
• Keywords: Auditory Interface, CHI 1993, Effective Means, Gaver’s Auditory Icons, Human Computer Interaction