We live in a world full of stimuli. We can see, smell, feel, taste and hear because stimuli surrounds us. However, when we are conceived in the womb of our mothers we are formed with no senses. During that time we are totally isolated from our environment. Interestingly enough senses start to develop only after 8 weeks of fetal development, being touch the first one to mature. Smell, taste, hearing and sight appear later on. Humans connect to their surroundings through senses, and as these senses start developing in our bodies our brain starts applying them to perceive our environment. Through our senses we are able to interact with our environment and we are able to learn, pass on knowledge, and form, create and treasure memories. It is because of our senses that we can enjoy the beautiful colors of autumn, the balmy breeze of late summer days, or the avian symphony of spring. Each sense is like a link through which we connect our inner self with the outside world and allows us to uniquely experience each setting. However, when one or more of the senses is missing, those links are broken and the outside world is perceived very differently from individual to individual. Experiencing the built environment is no different. Since buildings are usually designed with a fully sensory individual in mind sensory-impaired populations typically find it difficult to navigate or make use of the spaces the building offers. The following pages of this thesis demonstrate the universal access system as a tool for those who lack one or more of the senses in order for them to fully enjoy and use the spaces in the same way any fully sensorial person can. Another important aspect which is explored architectonically is the aspect of social inequalities, which many handicapped individuals face on regular basis as users of a building. / Master of Architecture

The representation of ourselves and our environment is based on the combination of information from multiple sensory systems. Each sensory modality is represented within a different frame of reference, in other words each sensory system uses a different code to represent the same properties of the environment (ex. visual stimuli in an eye-centered frame of reference; hand position would be shoulder-centered). Combing this information into a singular coordinate frame is complex. For instance, the eye and shoulder have different centers of rotation, therefore any changes in eye position or body posture will affect the relationship between them. What is still unknown is how the brain integrates these different sources of information into an internal representation, and what effect extra-retinal signals can have on this process. This thesis was designed to investigate the effect of head roll on action and perception. In Experiment 1, we wanted to determine how the integration of vision and proprioception for action was affected by changes in head roll. To investigate this question subjects performed a reaching task at three different head roll positions, where they would experience conflicts between their viewed and actual hand position. In Experiment 2, we examined the influence of head roll on sensory perception. To explore this idea subjects performed a task where they needed to judge the position of their unseen index fingertip relative to a visual target. Our findings reveal that eccentric head roll conditions influence both action and perception – revealed by an increase in movement variability and a decreased ability to discriminate the position of the unseen fingertip relative to visual targets. In summary, we have discovered that introducing eccentric head roll positions affects the perception of ourselves within the environment and the way that we integrate sensory information. / Thesis (Master, Neuroscience Studies) -- Queen's University, 2010-09-21 14:07:09.217

The present study was designed to investigate the efficiency of a visual and tactile presentation of a design as compared to just a visual presentation to determine if the two-sense method helped the subjects in drawing the designs accurately in less trials.

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Multi-sensory feedback can potentially improve user experience and performance in virtual environments. As it is complicated to study the effect of multi-sensory feedback as a single factor, we created a design space with these diverse cues, categorizing them into an appropriate granularity based on their origin and use cases. To examine the effects of tactile cues during non-fatiguing walking in immersive virtual environments, we selected certain tactile cues from the design space, movement wind, directional wind and footstep vibration, and another cue, footstep sounds, and investigated their influence and interaction with each other in more detail. We developed a virtual reality system with non-fatiguing walking interaction and low-latency, multi-sensory feedback, and then used it to conduct two successive experiments measuring user experience and performance through a triangle-completion task. We noticed some effects due to the addition of footstep vibration on task performance, and saw significant improvement due to the added tactile cues in reported user experience.

Packaging design has historically relied on visual properties to engage the customers and to communicate the product. However, such an approach is non-inclusive and vulnerable to data loss. The current paper supports the notion of a multi-sensory design that integrates multiple communicative properties (visual, auditory, tactual, olfactory and gustatory), in order to make the experience available to everyone, to redu-ce data loss and to contribute to happiness. A decade of studies has proven that a multi-sensory design (MSD) approach, can impact at a cognitive level by contributing to the mental well-being through senso-ry activation and product engagement. Thus, MSD has both an economic and an ecological value. As the United Nations are continuing their efforts to achieve the sustainable development goals, an MSD approach could help reach these goals; mainly Goal 3 Good health and well-being, Goal 12 Responsible consumptions and Goal 13 Climate actions.  The purpose of the current study is to understand how sensory elements are applied, and in what way they are manifested in packaging design today. To achieve the objectives, the current study has applied a quantitative content analysis in order to understand how MSD is applied in packaging design. Moreover, the analysis aimed to understand how sensory properties are used for marketing communication, and to find possible correlations between the level of applied MSD, the product materials and the price. For the analysis, 13 chocolate products from different price ranges were selected; as chocolate consumption is associated with evoking emotions. The content analysis revealed that all sensory properties, with the exception of olfactory, were present on all packages. Although olfactory was found on the packages that used a combination of card-board and plastic materials, the result was non-conclusive. Additionally, the analysis found that visual properties were dominant in marketing communication and that plastic materials emitted most sound. Fur- thermore, the analysis did not find that the higher-price products had more sensory elements.

Our Third Ear aims to create a multi-sensory experience by fusing sight, touch, and sound. By creating a means of physically feeling music, listeners can connect with songs, bands, and individual musicians on a profoundly personal level. The potential for unintended applications like learning to play an instrument, broadening the understanding of music for people with hearing impairments, or providing a means of therapy are also exciting prospects. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the process involved in creating a multi-sensory experience of music from concept to prototype. The culmination of interdisciplinary research and a broad range of creative technologies resulting in a working system. The multi-sensory experience consists of primarily tactile, but also visual responses triggered by music and executed in conjunction with aural music. Tactile investigation involved varied tactile sensations such as vibration, temperature, pressure, proprioception, and touch. Further research questioned the practicality, feasibility, and psychological impacts of using such sensations as well as where on the body such sensations would optimally be received. Visual research involved the visual representation of notes, chords, and sounds, as well as, how music could directly affect visuals in a real time environment. Additional research explored active interaction and passive interaction of visual cues using human computer interfaces. / Master of Fine Arts

Contented Architecture : In search of delight for all senses is an attempt to discover and capture the delightful sensory experiences of the users in the architectural space. Architectural space is seen as an artistic space, that appeals to different senses. The project is a Bike Hotel in Old Town, Alexandria. The situation and orientation of the building on site, the program and the features altogether make it possible for bikers to experience the space through different senses. This assembly among other pleasant experiences offers those sensory experiences that counteract the bikers daily exhaustive activities. Their bodies and minds feel relaxed, revitalized and encouraged to achieve their next goals. / Master of Architecture

The purpose of the study was to investigate the multi-sensory responses of children to symbolizing musical sound through speech rhythm patterns. Speech rhythm patterns consist of the number of syllables and the stress/nonstress relationships of these syllables in a word or a phrase. The research problems were (1) to determine children's responses to speech rhythm patterns according to the differential sensory modes used; (2) to determine the children's responses to speech rhythm patterns by age, and (3) to compare children's responses to speech rhythm patterns by age and sensory modes.

For adult English speakers studying Mandarin (Modern Standard Chinese), the acquisition of the Mandarin prosody presents major difficulties. One particularly problematic aspect of the Mandarin prosodic system, and the one singled out for research here is the acquisition of tones by second language (L2) learners of Mandarin. This thesis involves a literature review and a description of an experiment conducted for the purpose of assessing the effectiveness of a new teaching method for educating students in Mandarin prosody generally, but especially with regard to "tones." Most studies investigating the acquisition of Mandarin tones by L2 learners have treated tones as separate from other aspects of Mandarin prosody such as stress, loudness and duration. The teaching method examined in this thesis, however, takes an alternative approach. Here the acquisition of Mandarin prosody is approached as a complex dynamic that has tones as an integral part. The aims of the study are twofold: (1) to identify the principal problems encountered by most learners in order to discover the causes of recurrent error patterns and, (2) to find out how a multi-sensory approach, which in this study was called the Somatically Enhanced Approach (SEA), might influence the acquisition of Mandarin prosody in these areas. The experiment involved 22 adult Australian students studying Mandarin in the first three months of language training. The experimental component of the study consisted of an evaluation of two groups of students� oral conversations. The two groups of students were divided into a control group and an experimental group. The control group was trained in a nonmulti- sensory but communicative approach in 2001 and 2002. Their results are compared with those of a test group and with a group of students trained in the multi-sensory communicative approach (SEA) in 2003 and 2004. The test materials consisted of short dialogues that were likely to occur in everyday communication. Data was collected from each group, once during the first half of the first semester of study in each year. The findings of the experiment were that the order of difficulty of the four Mandarin tones was found to be similar for both the experimental and control groups of students. However, the order of difficulty differed from what has been reported by previous researchers. This suggests that the input and the type of task used to collect data might exert a significant influence on the learning of tones. In other words, the performance of subjects in the dialogues suggests that in the initial stages of learning, the major cause of errors was first language (L1) interference rather than the physical "difficulty" of articulating particular phonemes (or any features of Universal Grammar). Therefore, by using a multi-sensory approach (SEA) to the learning of Mandarin, it may be possible to considerablly lessen the influence of learners� L1 from the outset. Finally, a number of suggestions for improving the teaching of Mandarin prosody are made and future research directions outlined. Some salient suggestions for teaching of Mandarin prosody that arise from the research are: (1) To use movement and gesture in the early stages of learning to enhance students� perception and production of Mandarin. This approach provides students with useful memory tools for learning both in class and in self-accessed learning; (2) To teach Tone 3 not as a full Tone 3 but as a low level tone. This should not be done solely through a simple verbal explanation but through a combination of movement and gesture, provision of visual and auditory feedback and a large amount of exposure and perception training so that Tone 3 is recognised as a low level tone rather than a full Tone 3. By so doing confusion is reduced between the various realizations of Tone 3 during the initial learning stages; and (3) To caution students about the common error patterns caused by interference from their L1. This should be supplemented with opportunities for students to observe their own production of Mandarin and then experience how physically they can find ways of reducing the interference. A qualitative analysis of interview and question data obtained from this research also revealed that the extensive use of computer enhanced language learning and SEA work well together, not only efficiently conditioning students to the phonology of Mandarin, but dramatically changing students' strategies in learning and increasing their learning opportunities.