Navigate as a Bat. Real-Time Echolocation System in Virtual Reality

Several studies provide evidence that blind people orientthemselves using echolocation, transmitting signals withmouth clicks. Our previous study within embodiment inVirtual Reality (VR) showed the possibility to enhance aVirtual Body Ownership (VBO) illusion over a body mor-phologically different from human in the presence of agency.In this paper, we explore real-time audio navigation withecholocation in Virtual Environment (VE) in order to cre-ate a feeling of being a virtual bat. This includes imita-tion of the sonar system, which might help to achieve astronger VBO illusion in the future, as well as build anecholocation training simulator. Two pilot tests were con-ducted using a within-subject study design, exploring timeand traveled distance during spatial orientation in VE. Bothstudies, involved four conditions – early reflections, reverb,early reflections-reverb (with deprived visual cues) and fi-nally vision. This resulted in preferred reflection pulses forthe test subjects with musical background, while only re-verberation features were favored by non-musicians, whenbeing exposed to VE walking-based task.