Client: Universite de Technologie Compeigne
Publication: Paper publication for DPPI 2009

Starting point for this design was the difference in perceptual qualities during a face to face conversation and a telephone conversation. When talking to someone face to face, the way you perceive the other persons presence(including the perceptive actions and reactions) is totally different from the situation in which you talk to that same person on the telephone. Important difference between both types of conversations is the way you perceive the other one’s voice during the conversation and vice versa.

When talking to someone on the phone you are not aware of the changes of distance and direction of the other person compared to you, which makes it more difficult to understand the other person’s point of view an thus the emotional content that is communicated. In literature this ability of the listener to judge the direction and distance of a sound source is defined as auditory localization. This ability is influenced by different parameters, like time difference, frequency difference, reflection, vertical positioning difference etc.

To restore the loss of perceptual qualities during a telephone conversation a design application was built that tried to apply the principles of auditory localization in the context of a telephone conversation. The way this was done was by using the direction and distance of both subjects in space to influence the perceptual qualities of the voice perceived by both subjects. When e.g. Bob and Julia would have a telephone conversation, Julia experiences Bob as being in her living room, which is caused by the perceptual qualities added through auditory localization.