Examining the impact of multisensory language on perception and imagination: how can botanic gardens use audio description to enhance access for blind and partially sighted visitors?

This research project examines the impact of multisensory language on the imagination of listeners. This project is focussed on how to describe botanic gardens, and the research took place at the Chelsea Physic Garden (CPG). This thesis redefines audio description (AD) within a cognitive linguistic (CL) model, focussed on its function as sensory description. The central hypothesis is that multisensory description might be more effective as it may help listeners to generate more vivid sensory imagery due to the evidence for mental simulation, and the over-arching theory of grounded cognition. The secondary hypothesis is that metaphorical language might be more effective in helping listeners generate imagery due to the ability of metaphor to convey vivid and specific sensory information which may be impossible to express literally. This project uses a mixed methods approach to cognitively evaluate specific linguistic features in AD and the impact these might have on blind and partially sighted (BPS) visitors. There were four studies: (1) walking interviews exploring sensory experience in CPG with BPS people, (2) a linguistic experiment testing the effect of multisensory language on imagination, (3) an experiment testing the effect of metaphorical language on the imagination, (4) walking interviews exploring the cognitive role of imagery in the interpretation of audio-described tactile experiences in the garden. The findings suggested that the role of different senses in BPS people’s direct experience at the garden is nuanced and individual. However, the effect of sensory language is more universal, enhances the vividness of listeners’imagination – regardless of their level of vision. Metaphor in AD has a similar effect in that it enhances imagery, but in a more limited way. Applying these linguistic findings to audio-described tactile experiences at the CPG shows how AD can play a supporting or leading role in the experience, depending on the individual’s preferences, but that there is the need coherence between what is described and what a listener can touch.

Name dc:type.qualificationname

Ph.D.

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

PhD thesis

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Westminster

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Beale, Jessica

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Caink, A.D.
• Shaw, S.
• Kasstan, J.

Identifier

oai:westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk:x5w1w

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk:x5w1w