Sonification: A Method of Inquiry

In “Writing: A Method of Inquiry,” Laurel Richardson and Elizabeth Adams St. Pierre (2005) reflect on how writing is not simply a mode of dissemination or something we do to communicate research. Richardson conceptualizes writing as a research practice in and of itself. Writing as a method of inquiry foregrounds and examines how researchers construct knowledge about people, themselves, and the world through the practice of writing. Richardson proposes writing is a reflexive approach that can enable us to make sense of the process of knowledge production itself.¹

Similarly, we approach sonification as a method of inquiry through which we can understand (or misunderstand) our research data and the project’s broader findings. How could multimodal engagements with the same dataset enable us to glean different insights? Rather than strictly using sonification to disseminate knowledge, what if we employed it as a research method?

We appraise the possibilities offered by sonification by emphasizing the construction of knowledge through sound data rather than presenting sound data as a translation of knowledge. How can sonification be applied to amplify and distort a critical understanding of data breaches as security crises? How might it be used to uncover new entry points into the data set and topic for the research team?

Interestingly, sound data is used as a cybersecurity tool to effectively manage information security and analyze computer attacks by relying on auditory cues as an alternative to visualization. When sonification is used in the monitoring of computer networks, it can enhance situational awareness in computer network defense by enabling operators to achieve better understanding and performance with a reduced workload compared to visual techniques.^{2 3} From an accessibility standpoint, sonification can support individuals with low vision to perform this work and circumvent the overreliance on visual primacy.⁴

In our work, sonification was a means of enhancing our situational awareness of our understanding of data breaches as crises.

Because data is still sometimes perpetuated as objective ‘raw evidence’ that can produce universal knowledge independent of human influence when correctly managed, we wanted to stress through sound data how data originates from intricate, interconnected factors and requires human interpretation. Sonification was a method through which we could stress the subjective, personal, interpretive and messy qualities of research data to start connecting these complexities to the social, cultural, ethical, and aesthetic aspects of broader data paradigms.

Does producing multiple versions of a sonification undermine knowledge derived from the project, or does it augment it by corroborating how data breaches are experienced, understood and rendered knowable in heterogenous ways?

We used sonification as an exploratory and experimental method to examine data breach narratives in a multi-dimensional and multi-directional manner. We aimed to create “an emotional rather than a narrowly intellectual experience”⁵ by engaging the different affective registers of data breaches beyond what discourse analysis made audible to us.

Sonification enabled us to reconsider what we gleaned through discourse analysis. Could sonifying the data reveal new insights or trouble our interpretations of data breaches as crises? We experimented with sonification to enhance a critical understanding of data breaches as security crises in conjunction with critical discourse analysis.

---