Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript engages a timely and relevant topic, the role of audio stimuli in immersive virtual reality environments. It is a well-written and well-referenced article. However, it needs to establish better its significance and eventually its originality. The following issues need to addressed to improve it:

L23: Please add in the Abstract the impact of this study. What is the significance of visual target detection?

L47: Please explain the concept of binaural signal which is a focus of this study.

L56: Please explain the concepts of ‘auditory cue’ and ‘visual search task’.

L121: What was the identity / demographics of the participants?

L130: This is the first indication that the study is related to sports. I recommend adding this information in the keywords, the abstract and possibly also in the title.

L145-147: Please elaborate on the used materials: What is rationale behind this task? Why was this particular image of colourful animated character selected? What is its significance, applications, implications and potential impact?

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for their valuable comments. We think the manuscript has improved after we made the suggested changes.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Summary

In this paper, authors analyse the performance of finding an object with different sound techniques. To do so, in an immersive video environment, they use an eye tracker to take eye-related measurements. Authors have found that some measurements of eye movements confirm that binaural sound supports target location better than other alternatives.

Clarity of Exposition

The document is well written and structured. They are well defended and the methods used are well described.

Quality of References

References are abundant and compare their work with previous experiments.

Reproducibility

The experiment is well defined and could be replicated.

Overall Recommendation

Accept after minor revision

Explanation of Recommendation

The paper demonstrates a clear exposition of how an experiment is conducted. Although it may be intuitive that binaural sound is better than stereo, they have proven their hypothesis by incorporating an eye tracker to take measurements. They have shown that binaural is better in terms of TFF and GTL.

I think the only weakness of this work is the small number of participants as it is not a very complex or expensive task. This would help to confirm the data obtained and could clarify some of the conclusions drawn. In this sense, it would also be interesting to review the experiments with different demographic segments (mainly age).

I would also like to ask the authors about the possibility that the blink rate is affected by the use of VR goggles. Perhaps pupil size is also affected. It might be interesting to include it in the state of the art.

Author Response

We thank the reviewer for their comments and suggestions. Our responses are attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Authors addressed all raised issues in a satisfactory and hence the manuscript is fit for publication. Congratulations.