Towards the evaluation of the effects of ambient illumination and noise on quality of experience

The physical context, i.e., the characteristics of location and space where the multimedia service is consumed, may strongly influence the overall perceived Quality of Experience (QoE). In this paper, we investigate the effects of ambient illumination and noise on two multimedia consumption scenarios: watching a video on TV and reading a comic strip on tablet. To this aim, we organized an experiment considering different combinations of ambient illumination and introducing a disturbing noise. Then, we conducted a subjective quality assessment involving 20 people, who were asked to rate the perceived QoE using the 5-level Absolute Category Rating (ACR) quality scale and to express their emotions completing the Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM) questionnaire. The impact of illumination and noise on ACR ratings and SAM scores is evaluated computing the Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA). Finally, a QoE prediction model based on illumination and noise context factors is presented.