Emotion, Content, and Context in Sound and Music - Game Sound Technology and Player Interaction: Concepts and Developments - page 250

the rating of elements against their defined con-
structs, subjects were asked to perform a card
sorting exercise for each pair of constructs. The
use of triads was made to elicit the choice of
constructs by randomly selecting 3 elements and
once subjects began to struggle with the use of
triads they were asked to differentiate between 2
randomly selected elements. A total of 10 subjects
were selected to participate in the elicitation
process of the repertory grid interview. The age
of subjects interviewed ranged from 16 to 59,
with the average age being 34, and there was a
50/50 male/female gender split. The results of the
ten repertory grid interviews are presented in
Figure 5 and Figure 6.
Though the number of subjects involved in
the repertory grid interviews appears to be a low
population sample at first glance, the granularity
from these interviews comes from the sum num-
ber of constructs elicited across all participants.
Furthermore, the data retrieved using constructs
provides both qualitative and quantitative infor-
mation regarding the domain of enquiry.
In addition to the visual analysis of a reper-
tory grid, a PrinCom map, which makes use of
Principal Component Analysis (PCA), can be
derived that relates elements and constructs in
a graphical fashion where the visual distance
between elements and constructs is significant.
The PrinCom mapping integrates both elements
and constructs on a visual grid and shows the
relationship between the two. A PrinGrid for
the repertory grid derived in this investigation is
shown in Figure 7.
It is the constructs elicited that are particu-
larly of interest within the scope of this work. The
constructs used by subjects provide insight into
how they perceive music. As can be seen from
the grid in Figure 5 and Figure 6, the range of
constructs elicited provides an insight into, not
only how subjects typically perceive the sound
content of each musical genre but also, terms
relating to the context in which they place each
genre and occasional indications of the emo-
tional impact of each genre. For example, by also

looking at Figure 7 we can produce the notion
that blues music is “ emotionally evocative ” , has
“specific geography & history”, is placed in the
context of being “African American”, and is “mel-
low”. Naturally, there is some subjectivity present
here and these statements are open to interpreta-
tion, but to most readers it is expected that these
constructs should represent the group norm.
A perceived limitation of the repertory grid
technique to have been encountered during this
particular study is that of familiarity with the
elements under investigation by subjects, during
repertory grid interview. During interviews there
were clearly some elements that subjects were
definitely not as familiar with as others. It was
observed that subjects would often group together
the elements they were less familiar with when
rating elements against their chosen constructs.
Whilst it is appreciated that this phenomenon
is likely to be particularly present in this study,
due to music awareness firmly depending upon
personal preference or taste, it is doubtless likely
to occur in other scenarios.
Using a repertory grid sought to elicit human-
friendly descriptions of musical characteristics.
Although not strictly timbral definitions, these
constructs succeed in describing the characteristics
of musical genres. To put this into the context
of artistic definitions with the notion of a visual
metaphor, whilst timbre is a human description
of the colour of a sound or piece of music, these
constructs can be thought of as describing the
patterns ; the mix of shapes and colours that pro-
vides deeper information about the content and
the bigger picture
We find repertory grid investigation to be a
highly useful tool in determining group norms and
perceptions of important factors in any field that
is being explored. In the context of this chapter, it
can hopefully be seen that using such techniques
would allow information about how a group of
users would perceive a game and game sound in
terms of the content that constitutes the game along
with their emotional perceptions of the game and
the context in which they view it.