Causing Fear and Anxiety Through Sound Design in Video Games
By: Ahmed Abdel-Meguid
Supervisor: Paul Toprac
Masters of Interactive Technology degree conferred June 26, 2009
Thesis / Project completed: June 16, 2009

This project researched and tested how to cause fear and anxiety through sound design in video games. The project made the distinction between fear and anxiety and explored how the two emotions are linked while explaining how to effectively evoke those emotions using sound design. By selecting and designing sounds using Freud’s Id, Ego, and Superego theory as a baseline for human psyche, this project tested the use of volume, timing, and source in causing fear and anxiety in players.

This study used a Survival-Horror style level designed and constructed by the author. The player must find his or her way through an old and aging mansion during a nighttime thunderstorm while being ambushed by enemies from various hiding spots.

Twenty-seven Guildhall students were used as testers ranging from ages 22 to 40, predominantly male, from all backgrounds of video gaming. Results, based on quantitative and qualitative analysis of the data, suggested that the best method for causing fear is high-volume, well-timed, and sourced sound effects. For anxiety, data suggested the best method is medium-volume, untimed, and unsourced sound effects.

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