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A Charles Sturt University researcher is exploring how the use of three senses in the virtual world could help humans more easily absorb information and more importantly establish patterns and trends in large mounts of computer data.

Charles Sturt University (CSU) lecturer in Information Technology Dr Keith Nesbitt is researching how sound and touch as well as vision can help people decipher the useful patterns or trends in the information they are faced with in the modern world.

His approach takes advantage of the ability of humans to recognise patterns and involves understanding issues across a number of disciplines from human perception, user-interface design, software engineering and virtual environments.

“It is now possible to construct new styles of user interfaces that provide multi-sensory interactions. For example, interfaces can be designed which use 3D visual spaces so that we can physically hear, touch and manipulate virtual objects just as we do in the real world,” said Dr Nesbitt.

Using sound, touch and sight ... Dr Keith Nesbitt from Charles Sturt University.
photo: Frank Colzato

Unlike automated data mining, which uses algorithms to allow a computer to search for specific data, Dr Nesbitt’s approach taps into the human ability to perceive patterns.

He describes his work as very general allowing application in a wide variety of areas from interpreting data for trading on the stock market to investigating patterns in sporting events and medical information.

“Actually the possible application areas are almost unlimited,” he said.

Looking at stock market operations where traders make minute by minute decisions from data, Dr Nesbitt used his research to identify trading patterns based on the numbers of buyers and sellers which over time could predict the direction of a share price.

Before undertaking his PhD in this research area at the University of Sydney, Dr Nesbitt was employed as a research scientist and software engineer for BHP Research.

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Media Note: Charles Sturt University is celebrating the work of several key researchers, including Dr Nesbitt as part of National Science Week 2004 from Saturday 14 August until Sunday 22 August.

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