Inducing targeted brain states utilizing merged reality systems

As virtual reality becomes more accessible and the technology becomes greatly improved to immerse the individual in real time, there will be an impact upon the human brain and its direct functioning over states of mind. For as long as humans have noted that the brain responds to lights and sounds to aid or alter moods and mind states, technology has been used in one way or another to induce some desirable mood. This paper investigates how virtual technology could be used to forward this idea

Psychology Meets Archaeology: Psychoarchaeoacoustics for Understanding Ancient Minds and Their Relationship to the Sacred

How important is the influence of spatial acoustics on our mental processes related to sound perception and cognition? There is a large body of research in fields encompassing architecture, musicology, and psychology that analyzes human response, both subjective and objective, to different soundscapes. But what if we want to understand how acoustic environments influenced the human experience of sound in sacred ritual practices in premodern societies? Archaeoacoustics is the research field that investigates sound in the past. One of its branches delves into how sound was used in specific landscapes and at sites with rock art, and why past societies endowed a special significance to places with specific acoustical properties. Taking advantage of the advances made in sound recording and reproduction technologies, researchers are now exploring how ancient social and sacred ceremonies and practices related to the acoustic properties of their sound environment. Here, we advocate for the emergence of a new and innovative discipline, experimental psychoarchaeoacoustics. We also review underlying methodological approaches and discuss the limitations, challenges, and future directions for this new field

Immersive brain entrainment in virtual worlds: actualizing meditative states

Virtual Reality with associated hardware and software advances is becoming a viable tool in neuroscience and similar fields. Technology has been harnessed to modify a user’s state of mind for some time through different approaches. Combining this background with merged reality systems, it is possible to develop intelligent tools which can manipulate brain states and enhance training mechanisms

Sensory stimulations potentializing digital therapeutics pain control

For the past two decades, using Digital Therapeutics (DTx) to counter painful symptoms has emerged as a novel pain relief strategy. Several studies report that DTx significantly diminish pain while compensating for the limitations of pharmacological analgesics (e.g., addiction, side effects). Virtual reality (VR) is a major component of the most effective DTx for pain reduction. Notably, various stimuli (e.g., auditory, visual) appear to be frequently associated with VR in DTx. This review aims to compare the hypoalgesic power of specific stimuli with or without a VR environment. First, this review will briefly describe VR technology and known elements related to its hypoalgesic effect. Second, it will non-exhaustively list various stimuli known to have a hypoalgesic effect on pain independent of the immersive environment. Finally, this review will focus on studies that investigate a possible potentialized effect on pain reduction of these stimuli in a VR environment

MeditAid:a wearable adaptive neurofeedback-based system for training mindfulness state

A recent interest in interaction design is towards the development of novel technologies emphasizing the value of mindfulness, monitoring, awareness, and self-regulation for both health and wellbeing. Whereas existing systems have focused mostly on relaxation and awareness of feelings, there has been little exploration on tools supporting the self-regulation of attention during mindfulness sitting meditation. This paper describes the design and initial evaluation of MeditAid, a wearable system integrating electroencephalography (EEG) technology with an adaptive aural entrainment for real time training of mindfulness state. The system identifies different meditative states and provides feedback to support users in deepening their meditation. We report on a study with 16 meditators about the perceived strengths and limitations of the MeditAid system. We demonstrate the benefits of binaural feedback in deepening meditative states, particularly for novice meditators

Classification of soundscapes of urban public open spaces

It is increasingly acknowledged by landscape architects and urban planners that the soundscape contributes significantly to the perception of urban public open spaces. Describing and classifying this impact, however, remains a challenge. This article presents a hierarchical method for classification that distinguishes between backgrounded and foregrounded, disruptive and supportive, and finally calming and stimulating soundscapes. This four-class classification is applied to a growing collection of immersive audio-visual recordings of sound environments from around the world that could be explored using virtual reality playback. To validate the proposed methodology, an experiment involving 40 participants and 50 soundscape stimuli collected in urban public open spaces worldwide was conducted. The experiment showed that (1) the virtual reality headset reproduction based on affordable spatial audio with 360-degree video recordings was perceived as ecologically valid in terms of realism and immersion; (2) the proposed classification method results in well-separated classes; (3) membership to these classes could be explained by physical parameters, both regarding sound and vision. Moreover, models based on a limited number of acoustical indicators were constructed that could correctly classify a soundscape in each of the four proposed categories, with an accuracy exceeding 88% on an independent dataset

Towards soundscape fingerprinting: development, analysis and assessment of underlying acoustic dimensions to describe acoustic environments

Soundscape according to the definition in ISO 12913-1 describes an acoustic environment as perceived by humans in context. In order to be able to assess a soundscape holistically, the components acoustic environment, person and context should be described sufficiently to enable triangulation. Person-based soundscape assessment has been the subject of extensive research over the past decades to date, leading to a good understanding of the main emotional dimensions. On the acoustic side, e.g., in modeling emotional responses by acoustic features, parameters describing loudness are widely used, also from the point of view of legal regulations. These parameters are often complemented by established psychoacoustic measures. However, it is unknown to what extent these parameters are suitable to adequately describe and compare acoustic environments for hypotheses concerning humans. The presented dissertation aims to contribute to this field by means of an exploratory, empirical, and data-based approach. First, the general requirements of the aim – the description of acoustic environments – are defined and accompanied with concepts and findings from current research areas. Subsequently a methodology is developed that allows for the identification of underlying acoustic dimensions on the basis of empirical observational data of real world acoustic environments by means of multivariate statistical methods. It contains considerations on the physical sound field, the human auditory system, as well as appropriate signal processing techniques. The methodology is then applied to an exemplary extensive dataset of various Ambisonics soundscape recordings. The resulting expressions of the acoustic dimensions are evaluated and discussed with respect to plausibility and perceptual consistency. Finally, two application examples are presented to further validate the methodology and to test the applicability of acoustic dimensions in concrete research scenarios. It was found that the presented methodology is suitable to identify dimensions for the description of acoustic environments. Furthermore, the dimensions found form a suitable basis for further soundscape analyses.Soundscape (nach ISO 12913-1) beschreibt eine akustische Umgebung, wie sie von Menschen im Kontext wahrgenommen wird. Eine ganzheitliche Beurteilung einer Soundscape wird demnach durch Triangulation der Aspekte akustische Umgebung, Person und Kontext hergestellt. Die personenbezogene Bewertung von Soundscapes war und ist bis heute Gegenstand umfangreicher Forschungsarbeiten, die zu einem weitreichendem Verständnis der wichtigsten emotionalen Dimensionen geführt haben. Auf der akustischen Seite sind Parameter weit verbreitet, die die Lautstärke beschreiben. Ergänzt werden diese Parameter oft durch etablierte psychoakustische Größen. Unbekannt ist jedoch, inwieweit diese (psycho-)akustischen Parameter tatsächlich geeignet sind, Soundscapes zu beschreiben und zu vergleichen hinsichtlich den Menschen betreffender Hypothesen. Hierzu soll diese Dissertation einen Beitrag leisten. Der dabei verfolgte Ansatz ist explorativ, empirisch und datenbasiert. Zunächst werden Anforderungen an das Ziel – die Beschreibung akustischer Umgebungen – definiert und mit Konzepten aus aktuellen Forschungsgebieten ergänzt. Anschließend wird eine Methodik entwickelt, die es erlaubt, fundamentale akustische Dimensionen zu identifizieren auf der Basis empirischer Beobachtungsdaten realer akustischer Umgebungen und mit Hilfe multivariater statistischer Methoden. Sie enthält Überlegungen zum physikalischen Schallfeld, zur menschlichen Hörwahrnehmung sowie zu geeigneten Signalverarbeitungstechniken. Die Methodik wird anschließend auf einen beispielhaften Datensatz von Ambisonics Soundscape-Aufnahmen angewandt. Die resultierenden akustischen Dimensionen werden hinsichtlich ihrer Plausibilität und wahrnehmungsbezogenen Konsistenz diskutiert. Schließlich werden zwei Anwendungsbeispiele vorgestellt, um die Methodik weiter zu validieren und um die Anwendbarkeit der akustischen Dimensionen in konkreten Forschungsszenarien zu testen. Hierbei kann festgestellt werden, dass die gefundenen Dimensionen einen hohen Grad an Varianz akustischer Umgebungen erklären können und gut interpretierbar sind. Sie bilden somit eine geeignete Grundlage für die hier dargestellte Analyse von Soundscapes. Die Methodik ist dabei variabel erweiterbar, sodass vielfältige Anwendungen und Forschungsarbeiten bzgl. akustischer Umgebungen ermöglicht werden

Phenomenological study about enhancing university student's psychosocial wellbeing through YouTube videos: Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) in Finland

The present qualitative study aimed to explore how the attitudes, experiences, and feelings of Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) videos could be used to enhance psychosocial wellbeing similar to mindfulness-based treatment programs. ASMR is an atypical and multisensory phenomenon in which a tingling sensation is often elicited following specific audio-visual stimulations. Although ASMR experiences have been announced to enhance wellbeing and phenomenologically superimposed with mindfulness, there is a lack of research exploring how ASMR experiences relate to wellbeing. In this study, the theoretical underpinnings of the Differential Susceptibility to Media Effects Model (DSMM) by Patti M. Valkenburg and Jochen Peter (2013) are merged with Positive psychology's wellbeing theory (PERMA) by Seligman (2011) for the first time with the objective to explore and link the distinguishing characteristics of ASMR video with wellbeing outcomes. The study entailed two in-depth semi-structured interviews, which were conducted with three university students (one female and two males) in Finland. Interpretative phenomenological analysis with coding schemes was employed and guided by DSMM and Seligman's five domains of well-being. Three main themes and fourteen subthemes emerged from the analyses of the interview transcripts corresponding to the research question. The main themes include ASMR intentional use, ASMR media contents, and ASMR multisensory integration. The subthemes encompass prior ASMR-like experiences, social pressure from family members and curiosity, different types of sound, voices, and movement; nostalgic thoughts, pro-change bias, and positive responses. Exploration of interviewees' narratives further brought to light issues concerning ASMR's emotional effects on wellbeing. Analyses reveal different subthemes clustered into five main themes: Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships (Connectedness), Meaning and Making a Connection, and Accomplishment. The findings showed how ASMR videos enhance wellbeing through mindfulness-like experiences. These research findings are significant due to the ASMR videos' potential to increase wellbeing and happiness. Furthermore, their influence can extend to elevating the ability to concentrate on tasks at hand, improving the quality of sleep by stopping rumination, increasing self-confidence, and motivating altruistic behavior. The beneficial potential of ASMR videos to promote psychosocial wellbeing is remarkable

Sonic Interactions in Virtual Environments

This open access book tackles the design of 3D spatial interactions in an audio-centered and audio-first perspective, providing the fundamental notions related to the creation and evaluation of immersive sonic experiences. The key elements that enhance the sensation of place in a virtual environment (VE) are: Immersive audio: the computational aspects of the acoustical-space properties of Virutal Reality (VR) technologies Sonic interaction: the human-computer interplay through auditory feedback in VE VR systems: naturally support multimodal integration, impacting different application domains Sonic Interactions in Virtual Environments will feature state-of-the-art research on real-time auralization, sonic interaction design in VR, quality of the experience in multimodal scenarios, and applications. Contributors and editors include interdisciplinary experts from the fields of computer science, engineering, acoustics, psychology, design, humanities, and beyond. Their mission is to shape an emerging new field of study at the intersection of sonic interaction design and immersive media, embracing an archipelago of existing research spread in different audio communities and to increase among the VR communities, researchers, and practitioners, the awareness of the importance of sonic elements when designing immersive environments