Performance Effects of Crossmodal Links in Attention: Do They Scale To Complex Environments?
Single Paper Presentation

Nadine Sarter
Department of Industrial and Operations Engineering - Center for Ergonomics, University of Michigan

Thomas Ferris
University of Michigan

Shameem Hameed
University of Michigan

     Abstract ID Number: 31
     Full text: Not available
     Last modified: March 8, 2006

Abstract
Over the past decade, the development of multimodal human-machine interfaces for various real-world domains has seen a surge in interest. To date, the design of these interfaces has rarely taken into consideration research findings suggesting the existence of crossmodal spatial and temporal links in attention. This can be explained, in part, by the fact that crossmodal links have been studied primarily in laboratory settings involving few and simple cues and tasks. It is not clear whether the findings from these studies scale to more complex settings. This paper will present findings from a recent study examining the question of scalability in the context of a military simulation. While driving a vehicle through hostile territory, participants were presented with lateralized visual indications that informed them about the location of roadside mines. Ipsilateral and contralateral auditory and tactile cues preceded these visual indications at varying stimulus-onset asynchronies (SOAs). Our findings indicate that detection rates for, and response times to, crossmodal targets improved significantly at SOAs above 500ms. This effect was independent of cue validity for target detection only. Overall, these results highlight the importance of taking into account crossmodal links in attention to ensure the effectiveness and robustness of multimodal interfaces.