Type of Auditory cues and Apparatus influence how Healthy Young Adults Integrate Sounds for Dynamic Balance

(16 females, aged 19–36) were asked to avoid a ball according to a specific visual rule. Visuals were projected from the HTC Vive head-mounted display in an acoustically controlled space. We varied the environment by adding congruent or incongruent sounds as well as creating a multimodal (visual and congruent sounds) vs. unimodal (visual or congruent sounds only) display of stimuli. Sounds were played over headphones or loudspeakers. We quantified Reaction Time (RT) and Accuracy (choosing the correct direction to move) by capturing the head movement. We found that in the absence of sounds, RT was slower with headphones compared to loudspeakers, but the introduction of either congruent or incongruent sounds resulted in faster movements with headphones compared to the silent condition. Participants utilized congruent sounds to improve accuracy but were able to disregarded incongruent sounds such that their performance was not hindered regardless of the apparatus. Participants leveraged sounds played over loudspeakers, but not over headphones, to enhance accuracy in a unimodal dark environment (i.e., sound only).

在本次实验中，共招募了16名年龄介于19至36岁之间的女性参与者，要求她们根据特定的视觉规则避开球体。实验在声学控制的区域内进行，通过HTC Vive头戴式显示器投射视觉刺激。我们通过添加一致的或不一致的声音以及创建多模态（视觉与一致声音）与单模态（仅视觉或一致声音）的刺激显示来改变环境。声音通过耳机或扬声器播放。我们通过捕捉头部运动来量化反应时间（RT）和准确性（选择正确的移动方向）。研究发现，在没有声音的情况下，与扬声器相比，使用耳机时的反应时间较慢；然而，引入一致或不一致的声音均导致耳机条件下的移动速度比静音条件更快。参与者利用一致的声音来提高准确性，但能够忽略不一致的声音，从而无论使用何种设备，其表现均未受到影响。在单模态的暗环境中（即仅声音），参与者利用扬声器而非耳机播放的声音来提高准确性。