Audio spatialisation strategies for multitasking during teleconferences

Multitasking during teleconferences is becoming increasingly common: participants continue their work whilst monitoring the audio for topics of interest. Our previous work has established the benefit of spatialised audio presentation on improving multitasking performance. In this study, we investigate the different spatialisation strategies employed by subjects in order to aid their multitasking performance and improve their user experience. Subjects were given the freedom to place each participant at a different location in the acoustic space both in terms of azimuth and distance. Their strategies were based upon cues regarding keywords and which participant will utter them. Our findings suggest that subjects employ consistent strategies with regard to the location of target and distracter talkers. Furthermore, manipulation of the acoustic space plays an important role in multitasking performance and the user experience.