The Sound of Being There: Presence and Interactive Audio in Immersive Virtual Reality

The concept “presence”—often defined as the sensation of “being there”—has received increasing attention in the last decades. Out of the many domains of application, presence is particularly relevant in relation to Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR). Despite the growing attention in the concept presence, the influence of the auditory modality remains relatively unexplored, compared with its visual counterpart.
This chapter provides an overview of past and current conceptualizations of presence and discusses how the auditory modality may influence presence within IVR. After an introduction to the comprehensive topic presence, the latest significant development within presence theory is introduced, Mel Slater’s conceptual framework for describing why individuals may respond realistically when exposed to IVR. With an outset in this conceptual framework, the remainder of the chapter is dedicated to illustrating how sound production and perception relate to the four constituents of the framework: immersion, illusions of place, illusions of plausibility, and virtual body ownership.