Despite the progress of helmet hardware and the design of thoughtful software, virtual reality can always be a foul, dizzying and sweaty experience for some people. Horrible rides on virtual roller coasters with alarming jumps withSaberYou don’t have to talk to many people before someone shares an experience inducing vomiting.
As a psychologist at York St John University, in the United Kingdom, I specialize in the way the bearers react to RV, and I was therefore in a privileged position to observe the evolutionary approaches to the problem of cybersickness. Significant progress in equipment – including an improved field of vision, higher resolution and reduced latency – have not completely solved problems. Software conceptions such as adding virtual nose to display, visual attention tasks aimed at redirecting the user’s objective, and improved visual realism was all promising in the laboratory, but has proven to be frustrating in a consistent manner in the real world.
But a new wave of research can remove the pressure from engineers and developers and give it to the consumer. Research focuses on DIY techniques that allow users to better face virtual reality. Here are three promising approaches.
# 1: Stand like a flamingo
There are different theories on the underlying causes of cybersickness. An idea focuses on postural instability. In real life, our brains interact with our vestibular and proprioceptive systems, which give us a general meaning of the place where our heads or our bodies are in the world and create a physiological response that maintains our balance and prevents us from falling.
Maintaining your balance is more difficult in virtual reality; The world seems to move, but your body does not feel it. It turns out that your ability to balance is a good predictor of your sensitivity to Cybersickness. When the researchers studied artistic skaters, football players and Wushu fighters, for example, those most resistant to Cybersickness were artistic skaters.
Thus, researchers in South Korea have explored whether the training of people to be balanced in RV, to give them greater postural stability, would also reduce cybersickness. Participants trained for 3 minutes, twice a day, for five days. In the control group, the participants simply got up and looked at an experience specifically chosen for its movement models inducing the disease. In the training group, the participants watched while they stood on one leg with their tense arms – the installation of the flamingo – for 30 seconds, followed by 30 seconds of position on two legs, repeated three times.
At the end of the week, the two groups said they had fewer symptoms of Cybersickness while watching the training models. The participants were then shown again content: VR experience on space exploration. While the control group said it felt almost as sick as before the training, those who had held as a flamingo have reported much less illness in the new experience, with statistically significant reductions in disorientation. Learning to balance in VR meant that they could better manage other VR experiences, not only that to which they get used to.
New techniques that are promising by reducing cybersickness include balance exercises [top]leaning over an apparent movement in virtual environments [middle]and bearing devices that stimulate the vestibular system [bottom].Gyginfography.com
# 2: Lean
If standing like a flamingo does not seem attractive, you can try to react to the movement in the virtual environment. This technique implies a postural alignment, and as the installation of flamingos, it is based on the idea that postural instability is an important factor in cybersickness.
If you have already been on roller coaster, you will have an intuition on how it works. While the roller coaster bend to the right, you oppose the movement by leaning on the left; As he heads to the left, you look to the right. Although it looks like the most natural thing to do, it is actually useless for transport evil. You should rather lean “in the Tour – while going right if you go right and left if you go to the left, as does a motorcyclist when you take a high speed turn.
Leaning on the movement seems to do the same in VR. Researchers in the Netherlands and in Greece have joined forces to explore it. In their study, they opted for simulations of virtual driving on a Meta Quest 3 helmet. What counted was how the participants aligned their bodies on the implicit movement. Those who have maintained a narrower postural alignment with the virtual movement have experienced much fewer cybersickness, with the probability of aggravation of cybersickness with growing disalg off.
# 3: Feel vibrations
You don’t want to stand up like a flamingo or lean everywhere? Well, how about vibrating the bones of your skull? This solution requires pressing the service of a type of portable technology which is not yet commonly available: a vestibular stimulation device, which sends few vibrations to the inner ear. Researchers test these devices to treat seasickness and symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. Companies like Otolith Labs are now looking for approval to sell their products beyond the research community. Research at the University of Newcastle, Australia, has tested whether the devices could facilitate Cybersickness VR by reducing the inadequacy between vestibular signals and visual signals. In VR, your eyes tell you that your body moves, but your body is convinced that this is not the case, and the gap is simply too much for the mind to face. By vibrating the inner ear with a stimulator, thought is, people can become more tolerant of inadequacy.
Our ability to balance is a good predictor of cybersickness.
To test the idea, the researchers used one of the most disgusting experiences you can have in VR: a virtual russian mountain. Participants experienced the roller coaster with the vestibular device attached to the mastoid bone behind the right ear and put to any vibration, low vibration adjustment or average adjustment.
The participants then led the Russian mountains VR up to 15 minutes, verbally signaling their levels of nausea each minute. The control group did not have a vibration device, another group had the device on a low adjustment and a final group had the device on an average adjustment. The control group recorded an average of 478 seconds in the journey before choosing to end the experience, or the staff put an end to the experience due to high levels of reported nausea. Those with the low vibration parameter lasted considerably longer, at 568 seconds, and those with the average adjustment lasted 623 seconds.
Consumer
Of course, none of these approaches is guaranteed to work. They are based on pilot projects involving a small number of participants and pending replication. What makes them different from the past is that anyone can try at least the first two at home at the moment, and there is not a huge obstacle to finally try the third.
In the end, Cybersickness has many possible causes and associations. Maybe the future helmets will reduce the problem. Maybe VR well-designed experiences will also help you. But the most promising path in the long term is probably a combination of engineering solutions, design solutions and approaches initiated by the user – such as leaning, standing like a flamingo and vibrate these bones. Only time will tell us, but perhaps one day the disgusting curse of VR will be broken.
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