Investigations on the Impact of Listener Movement on the Perception of Source Directivity in Virtual Acoustic Environments

An authentic and plausible simulation of virtual acoustic environments requires, among many other aspects, a thorough understanding of how a listener perceives the directivity of a sound source. State-of-the-art VR applications allow the user to explore a virtual scenario while walking around freely. It is assumed that the translation of the listener in the scene contributes to the understanding of the scene and the sound source directivity. The aim of the research is to examine this impact of listener translations on the perception more closely. In this contribution a new test method to evaluate the perception using listener translation in virtual acoustic environments is presented. The experiment is conducted with binaural real-time auralization for tracked listener movements. A free-field scenario and a reverberant room are chosen as test conditions.