Evaluation of Recognition Performance for Direction Detection of Sequential Sound in Evacuation Guidance System

Abstract

It is an important issue to develop an effective guidance system in a disaster. Several guidance systems have been proposed in addition to the facilitating emergency exit signs and implemented in some actual facilities using light stimulus or sound stimulus. Considering emergency situations that are raising in disasters such as blackouts, outbreak of smoke, and facility of damages, it is better way to implement several kinds of guidance systems using optical and sound signals for sight and hearing. The goal of our research project is to develop and implement an effective evacuation guidance system in which an egress root is instructed to evacuees using a sequential sound system. In this paper we discuss the recognition performance for direction detection of sequential sound emitting by the guidance system in order to discuss the effectiveness of the guidance system. For this aim the several experiments were conducted, in which the subjects judge direction of the sequential sound from the array of speakers under several conditions with respect to kind of sound, speed of sound, length between speakers and so on. The results of these experiments lead some characteristics for the recognition of direction of sequential sound.