Annoyance and Urgency of Auditory Alerts for in-Vehicle Information Systems

Abstract

The proliferation of in-vehicle information systems and the need for drivers to keep their eyes on the road suggest that auditory alerts will become increasingly common. This study examined how sound parameters affected perceived urgency and annoyance. The sound parameters investigated were overall density of a warning tone, pulse speed and type of burst used to create a warning tone. The context in which the auditory alert is presented was an additional factor. Significant effects were found for all factors. Annoyance and urgency of an alert depend on the context in which it is presented and sound parameters interact with context to affect the perceived urgency of alerts. Like urgency, annoyance displayed systematic variation as a function of warning signal parameters. These results suggest that auditory alert design should go beyond mapping perceived urgency of the alert to the urgency of messages, but should also consider a tradeoff analysis that addresses the costs of increasing annoyance.