Towards a Better Understanding of Auditory Feedback in Warehouse Management Systems to Improve Usability

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of enhanced auditory feedback on the usability of equipment scanning on handheld devices in Warehouse Management Systems (WMSs). Today, warehouses deal with labor shortages and optimization challenges. There is a grow- ing recognition of the significance of incorporating multimodality to craft immersive user experiences (UX) and to provide more nat- ural and robust interaction, which is important for WMSs due to the pursuit of low error rates and high efficiency. While visual feedback is commonly used in WMSs, audio feedback during bar- code and RFID scanning is often overlooked and limited to beeps. Both auditory icons and earcons have proven to positively impact usability issues in other domains, but there is still a gap in the liter- ature regarding usability impact in the warehousing domain. Our research includes a threefold of qualitative and quantitative studies consecutively exploring, verifying, and validating auditory feed- back for WMSs. Potential improvements are explored, of which the sound design will then be verified. During the validation step, four conditions are quantitatively evaluated on task completion time, number of errors, perceived workload, annoyance, and subjective rating. Enhanced auditory feedback has lower perceived workload, is less frustrating and less annoying compared to conventional audi- tory feedback. RFID scanning is more efficient and effective, while barcode/QR code scanning is less mentally demanding and has a higher SUS score. The results of this study contribute to a better understanding of how usability in warehouses could be improved, which in turn impacts the ongoing optimization challenges and solves potential labor shortages because of improved UX. Results could be extended to other domains where scan processes are used, like in retail or transport.