Reaction Time Differences Across Auditory Notifications in a Real-Time Strategy Game

Abstract

Auditory notifications are widely used in games and interactive systems to communicate urgent information, redirect attention, and support timely responses. Prior research has compared them across various contexts, such as medical devices, driving, and navigation systems, often suggesting that more semantically explicit sounds can improve recognition and response performance. However, less is known about how these notifications behave in the context of games where players divide attention between ongoing central gameplay and secondary time-sensitive events. This dissertation investigates how three different types of auditory notifications (Earcons, Auditory Icons and Speech) influence players' reaction time in an Action Mechanic, a time-sensitive gameplay situation. Around 30 participants played three scenarios in Age of Empires II, each using a different auditory notification to signal that the Action Mechanic of the player's base being under attack. Players' reaction times were quantitatively analyzed in order to compare the effects of the different notification types. Following each round, participants were asked two questions relating to the clearness of the significance of the auditory notification, as well the first part of the Nasa TLX. In the end, participants were asked to rank the auditory notifications from best to worst and to justify their reasoning. Results indicate that Earcons produced the fastest reaction times, despite being the least preferred notification type among participants, with Auditory Icons and Speech coming second and third respectively. This finding appears to diverge from some previous literature, which often associates more semantically explicit auditory notifications with faster responses. These results suggest that, in time-sensitive gameplay situations, the notification type that supports the fastest response may not necessarily be the one that players or designers perceive as the most preferable.