Aviv Elor, Adrian Parrales, Strauss Michael Bourdon, Maxim Kuznetsov, Kamryn Callwood, Alyssa Tu, Michael Powell, Ash Robbins, Matthew Bundle, Felicia Skelton, Hilary Touchett
{"title":"Co-designing meaningful extended reality for physical rehabilitation: a stakeholder-driven approach to embodied telehealth.","authors":"Aviv Elor, Adrian Parrales, Strauss Michael Bourdon, Maxim Kuznetsov, Kamryn Callwood, Alyssa Tu, Michael Powell, Ash Robbins, Matthew Bundle, Felicia Skelton, Hilary Touchett","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2025.1675309","DOIUrl":"10.3389/frvir.2025.1675309","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Introduction: </strong>Extended Reality (XR) technologies offer unprecedented opportunities to redefine physical rehabilitation experiences through embodied telepresence and full-body motion tracking. Realizing meaningful XR in physical rehabilitation requires stakeholder input addressing remote embodied therapy's unique design challenges.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>This study presents one of the first stakeholder co-design workshops on embodied telehealth for physical rehabilitation, engaging participants [N = 24 total including ten clinicians, eight patients, three designers, and three engineers] across five focus groups with stakeholders from clinical, academic, and industry settings. Through structured usability testing and a four-axis framework analysis, we evaluated immersive Virtual Reality (VR) applications supporting synchronous clinician-led embodied appointments and asynchronous clinician-authored patient home exercise programs with full-body tracked avatars and biomechanical assessments.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Stakeholder feedback reinforced the need for embodied agency with adaptive input modalities for diverse patient needs, ensuring clinical authenticity through real-time full-body tracking for accurate movement correction and scaling interaction complexity from minimal interfaces for VR novices (78% of participants) to customizable clinical dashboards. Crossstakeholder prioritization identified minimalist XR interface navigation (19 votes) and flexible clinical assessment capabilities (17 votes) as the highest-priority design requirements, while exit surveys suggested high patient comfort (M = 4.50/5) and strong clinician adoption interest (M = 4.14/5).</p><p><strong>Discussion: </strong>We propose six design principles for meaningful XR telehealth in physical rehabilitation: 1) embodied guidance with real-time feedback, 2) progressive complexity with minimalist defaults, 3) adaptive accessibility through multi-modal input, 4) clinical authenticity via domain-specific assessments, 5) biomechanical precision for trust and safety, and 6) contextual onboarding to improve therapeutic competency. These findings offer design considerations for developing embodied XR telehealth systems that support sustained therapeutic engagement and meaningful rehabilitation outcomes.</p>","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"6 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2026-01-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC13450176/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148698498","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Acceptance of augmented reality for laboratory safety training: methodology and an evaluation study","authors":"Muhannad Ismael, Roderick McCall, Fintan McGee, Ilyasse Belkacem, Mickaël Stefas, Joan Baixauli, Didier Arl","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2024.1322543","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2024.1322543","url":null,"abstract":"This paper presents a proof-of-concept Augmented Reality (AR) system known as “SMARTLab” for safety training in hazardous material science laboratories. The paper contains an overview of the design rationale, development, methodology, and user study. Participants of the user study were domain experts (i.e., actual lab users in a material science research department, n = 13), and the evaluation used a questionnaire and free-form interview responses. The participants undertook a virtual lab experiment, designed in collaboration with a domain expert. While using the AR environment, they were accompanied by a virtual assistant. The user study provides preliminary findings about the impact of multiple dimensions, such as Performance Expectancy, Emotional Reactivity, and Spatial Presence, on SMARTLab acceptance by analyzing their influence on the Behavioral Intention dimension. The findings indicate that users find the approach useful and that they would consider using such a system. Quantitative and qualitative analysis of the SMARTLab assessment data suggests that a) AR-based training is a potential solution for laboratory safety training without the risk of real-world hazards, b) realism remains an important property for some aspects such as fluid dynamics and experimental procedure, and c) use of a virtual assistant is welcome and provides no sense of discomfort or unease. Furthermore, the study recommends the use of AR assistance tools (a virtual assistant, an attention funnel, and an in-situ arrow) to improve usability and make the training experience more user-friendly.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"5 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-04-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frvir.2024.1322543/pdf?isPublishedV2=False","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147920694","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Unveiling gender differences: a mixed reality multitasking exploration","authors":"Safanah Abbas, Heejin Jeong","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1308133","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1308133","url":null,"abstract":"While gender differences have been studied in both real and virtual worlds separately, few studies have focused on multitasking in hybrid environments. This study investigated the gender factor in multitasking within a mixed reality environment. Thirty-six participants completed eight experimental conditions to assess their workload, task priority, and hand usage. Two distinct tasks were employed in the experiment: a block-matching task for the physical world, where participants located and matched English letters with their corresponding positions on a wooden board, and the N-back task for the virtual world. Four conditions focused on digital-physical monotasking, while the rest involved mixed-reality multitasking. The results reveal that perceived mental demand is a significant factor. Males prioritized virtual tasks, whereas females prioritized both tasks equally. Understanding the factors influencing gender-based performance differences can enhance the design of practical mixed reality applications, addressing equity and quality concerns. This study suggests that cognitive load plays a vital role in determining how genders perform when juggling multiple tasks, both physical and virtual.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"1 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139439649","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Katarina Vagaja, Klaus Linkenkaer-Hansen, Athanasios Vourvopoulos
{"title":"Avatar embodiment prior to motor imagery training in VR does not affect the induced event-related desynchronization: a pilot study","authors":"Katarina Vagaja, Klaus Linkenkaer-Hansen, Athanasios Vourvopoulos","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1265010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1265010","url":null,"abstract":"Motor-imagery brain-computer interfaces (MI-BCIs) have the potential to improve motor function in individuals with neurological disorders. Their effectiveness relies on patients’ ability to generate reliable MI-related electroencephalography (EEG) patterns, which can be influenced by the quality of neurofeedback. Virtual Reality (VR) has emerged as a promising tool for enhancing proprioceptive feedback due to its ability to induce a sense of embodiment (SoE), where individuals perceive a virtual body as their own. Although prior research has highlighted the importance of SoE in enhancing MI skills and BCI performance, to date, no study has successfully isolated nor manipulated the SoE in VR before MI training, creating a gap in our understanding of the precise role of the priming effect of embodiment in MI-BCIs. In this study, we aimed to examine whether the virtual SoE when induced, as priming of avatar embodiment, and assessed before MI training, could enhance MI-induced EEG patterns. To achieve this, we divided 26 healthy participants into two groups: the embodied group, which experienced SoE with an avatar before undergoing VR-based MI training, and the non-embodied group, which underwent the same MI training without a prior embodiment phase, serving as a control. We analyzed subjective measures of embodiment, the event-related desynchronization (ERD) power of the sensorimotor rhythms, lateralization of ERD, and offline classification BCI accuracy. Although the embodiment phase effectively induced SoE in the embodied group, both groups exhibited similar MI-induced ERD patterns and BCI classification accuracy. This suggests that the induction of SoE prior to MI training may not significantly influence the training outcomes. Instead, it appears that the integration of embodied VR feedback during MI training itself is sufficient to induce appropriate ERD, as evidenced by previous research.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"24 11","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139445417","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Redirected walking for exploration of unknown environments","authors":"Mathieu Lutfallah, Marco Ketzel, Andreas M. Kunz","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1259816","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1259816","url":null,"abstract":"Real walking is the most natural locomotion method for exploring Virtual Environments (VE), enhancing the immersion of Virtual Reality (VR). Redirected Walking (RDW) is employed to enable real walking within limited tracking spaces in large VEs by subtly manipulating the mapping between the virtual and real environments. However, the effectiveness of RDW is greatly influenced by the convex shape and size of the manually defined physical tracking space, subsequently impacting the user’s immersive experience. To improve performance, one strategy is to integrate exploration methods from mobile robotics with RDW. This will expand the usable tracking space, facilitating dynamic environments and rapid exploration. For this, we adapted a Unity framework for an RDW algorithm to facilitate simulations for such an exploration. We conducted a simulation with artificially created non-convex explorable tracking spaces and pre-recorded path elements, simulating two adapted RDW artificial potential field (APF) concepts. Three conceptualized modes were applied: repulsive APF, exploration APF, and exploration APF with a distance threshold. Additionally, one APF was extended with a frontier-based exploration approach that utilized the path between the user’s position and a targeted frontier. The analysis revealed a significant trade-off between exploration and immersion. APF combined with frontier-based the exploration technique showed the fastest exploration speed, but - however - resulted in the lowest distance between resets.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"45 19","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139447725","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"EntangleVR++: evaluating the potential of using entanglement in an interactive VR scene creation system","authors":"Mengyu Chen, Marko Peljhan, Misha Sra","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1252551","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1252551","url":null,"abstract":"Interactive digital stories provide a sense of flexibility and freedom to players by allowing them to make choices at key junctions. These choices advance the narrative and determine, to some degree, how the story evolves for that player. As shown in prior work, the ability to control or participate in the construction of the narrative can give the player a high level of agency that results in a stronger sense of immersion in the narrative experience. To support the design of this type of interactive storytelling, our system, EntangleVR++, borrows the idea of entanglement from quantum computing. Our use of entanglement allows creators and storytellers control over which sequences of story events take place in correlation with each other, initiated by the choices a player makes. In this work, we evaluated how well our idea of entanglement enables creators to easily and quickly design interactive Virtual reality narratives. We asked 16 participants to use our system and based on user interviews, analyses of screen recordings, and questionnaire feedback, we extracted four themes. From these themes and the study overall, we derived four authoring strategies for tool designers interested in the design of future visual interface for interactively creating virtual scenes that include relational objects and multiple outcomes driven by player interactions.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"59 20","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138945950","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Adriana Bastardas-Albero, Berta Vall, Carles Pérez-Testor, J. Losilla
{"title":"Which effective virtual reality (VR) interventions exist for the prevention and rehabilitation of intimate partner violence (IPV)?","authors":"Adriana Bastardas-Albero, Berta Vall, Carles Pérez-Testor, J. Losilla","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1263545","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1263545","url":null,"abstract":"Purpose: Prevention and rehabilitation of intimate partner violence (IPV) is a very important topic due to its high prevalence, visibility, and potential to generate negative consequences in survivor’s physical and mental health. Previous interventions have used traditional, explicit approaches giving mixed results for both prevention and rehabilitation. However, the number of implicit interventions using technological innovations, specifically virtual reality (VR), is limited in this field. In this review, we aim to find the existing literature on immersive VR targeting prevention or rehabilitation of IPV.Method: The search used several databases: PsycINFO by EBSCOHost, and Medline by PubMed, specifically set to find IPV intervention articles, published after 2010, that included VR in their intervention.Results: 11 studies met all of the eligibility criteria and were included in the review.Conclusion: VR has overall proven useful to tackle the prevention and rehabilitation of intimate partner violence, as it offers the unique possibility of experiencing a variety of situations from a different perspective, in a safe and controlled environment. Therefore, it is a tool which has great potential for transformation, as it allows for experiential and implicit learning.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"13 11","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138949183","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Alessio Travaglini, Esther Brand, Pascal Meier, Oliver Christ
{"title":"Job relevance or perceived usefulness? What features of immersive virtual reality software predict intention to use in a future project-based-learning scenario: a mixed method approach","authors":"Alessio Travaglini, Esther Brand, Pascal Meier, Oliver Christ","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1286877","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1286877","url":null,"abstract":"Not only since COVID-19, the topic of decentralized working and learning methods is becoming increasingly important for various reasons. New virtual reality technologies enable learning in immersive scenarios, which is good when learning from home is advised. However, not all immersive Virtual Reality (iVR) training incorporates learning systems that support complex, realistic, practical tasks that lead to a product or enable acquiring knowledge and life-enhancing skills like project-based learning. Although there are many iVR applications available that support project management, the specific features of these applications that lead to the intention to use (and therefore life-enhancing skills) have yet to be discovered. In this exploratory mixed-method study, we investigated the question of the importance of perceived usefulness (PU) and job relevance (JR) as predictors of intention to use (ItU) in a selection of immersive iVR application features. We started with market research and aggregated 88 software features in 13 categories of 34 professional iVR applications. After an expert selection and ranking procedure, a survey was developed. After deriving from the TAM 2 model and with a sample n = 103, we computed the relationship of JR, PU, and ItU. Although high values were generally observed, we found that the importance of PU is higher than JR when it comes to ItU. Limitations of the study are discussed, and suggestions for further research are given.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"15 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139003032","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Creating and manipulating 3D paths with mixed reality spatial interfaces","authors":"Courtney Hutton Pospick, Evan Suma Rosenberg","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1192757","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1192757","url":null,"abstract":"Mixed reality offers unique opportunities to situate complex tasks within spatial environments. One such task is the creation and manipulation of intricate, three-dimensional paths, which remains a crucial challenge in many fields, including animation, architecture, and robotics. This paper presents an investigation into the possibilities of spatially situated path creation using new virtual and augmented reality technologies and examines how these technologies can be leveraged to afford more intuitive and natural path creation. We present a formative study (n = 20) evaluating an initial path planning interface situated in the context of augmented reality and human-robot interaction. Based on the findings of this study, we detail the development of two novel techniques for spatially situated path planning and manipulation that afford intuitive, expressive path creation at varying scales. We describe a comprehensive user study (n = 36) investigating the effectiveness, learnability, and efficiency of both techniques when paired with a range of canonical placement strategies. The results of this study confirm the usability of these interaction metaphors and provide further insight into how spatial interaction can be discreetly leveraged to enable interaction at scale. Overall, this work contributes to the development of 3DUIs that expand the possibilities for situating path-driven tasks in spatial environments.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"48 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138596549","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Cybersickness as the virtual reality sickness questionnaire (VRSQ) measures it!? –an environment-specific revision of the VRSQ","authors":"Judith Josupeit","doi":"10.3389/frvir.2023.1291078","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3389/frvir.2023.1291078","url":null,"abstract":"Background: Virtual Reality (VR) does not only include the use of stereoscopic images, but also possibilities for an interaction with and participation in a computer-generated environment. However, laboratory studies primarily focus on the first part of the definition only. In this context, comparing results from different VR applications with diverging goals becomes difficult. This is especially true in the field of cybersickness research (visually induced motion sickness in VR), as self-report symptom questionnaires are used. The prominent Simulator Sickness Questionnaire (SSQ) is criticized for the lack of specificity, the double factorial loadings, the outdatedness, and the unrepresentative sample. VR-specific revisions like the Virtual Reality Sickness Questionnaire (VRSQ) address these criticisms but lack generalizability.Methods: The current paper uses a Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the VRSQ with data from three different VR environments and a sample size of N = 244. The environments had different setups, visual complexities, and interaction possibilities. These characteristics influenced the factorial structure of the VRSQ as a moderator. Furthermore, to control for VR-unrelated effects Baseline ratings were taken into account.Results: The Confirmatory Factor Analysis indicated a moderate fit for the global model, but a misspecification for two of the three environments. Only the environment similar to the original VRSQ paper converged with the model.Conclusions: In conclusion, a detailed description of the VR environment is required in scientific method reports. Focusing on VR accessibility for physically impaired in addition to healthy subjects, an added Baseline measurement can address the discriminant validity. Until generalizable VR-specific revisions of the SSQ are validated, the paper suggests using the Δ-SSQ in aggregated raw format.","PeriodicalId":73116,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers in virtual reality","volume":"7 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138596926","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}