MEMORY FOR AUDITORY ICONS AND EARCONS WITH LOCALIZATION CUES

This study was designed to test whether associations between visual icons on a computer screen and auditory icons (environmental sounds that have a direct association with an object) or earcons (synthetic sounds that have no direct association with an object) are easier to learn. In addition, localization of sound presentation relative to the position of the icons on the screen was tested. Results revealed that participants made faster and more correct matches between visual icons and auditory icons than between visual icons and earcons. The results also suggested that localization may be a useful cue for learning the associations between icons and their auditory counterparts; however, more research is needed to provide conclusive evidence. counterparts. Specifically, we believed that participants would be able to learn associations for icons with auditory icons more easily than with earcons due to the non-arbitrary mapping for auditory icon sounds. For a matching memory task, we hypothesized that there would be more correct matches for visual icons paired with auditory icons versus earcons. We also predicted that matches would be made more quickly between icons and auditory icons than between icons and earcons. In addition, localization of sound was tested to determine if this would impact memory for the sound associations with the icons. The auditory icons or earcons were presented to participants either through both ears (non-localized) or in the right ear for icons in the right column on the screen, the left ear for those in the left column, and to both ears for the icons in the middle column (localized). The hypothesis was that localized sound presentation should lead to more correct matches with icons for both auditory icons and earcons than non-localized sounds.