Effects of Travel Technique on Cognition in Virtual Environments

We compared four different methods of travel in an immersive virtual environment and their effect on cognition using a between-subjects experimental design. The task was to answer a set of questions based on Crook’s condensation of Bloom’s taxonomy to assess the participants’ cognition of a virtual room with respect to knowledge, understanding and application, and higher mental processes. Participants were also asked to draw a sketch map of the testing virtual environment and the objects within it. Users’ sense of presence was measured using the Steed-Usoh-Slater Presence Questionnaire.

Our results suggest that for applications where problem solving and interpretation of material is important, or where opportunity to train is minimal, then having a large tracked space so that the participant can physically walk around the virtual environment provides benefits over common virtual travel techniques.

Conditions

Testing Environment

Participants:

Catherine Zanbaka, Ph.D. Student

Benjamin Lok, Post Doctoral Fellow, now at the University of Florida

Sabarish Babu, Ph.D. Student

Dan Xiao, MS Student

Amy Ulinski, MS Student

Larry F. Hodges, Professor

Papers:

Zanbaka, C., Lok, B., Babu, S., Xiao, D., Ulinski, A., Hodges, L.F. (2004). Effects of travel technique on cognition in virtual environments. Accepted to IEEE Virtual Reality 2004 (March 27-31, Chicago, IL USA).

For more information contact: Catherine Zanbaka, czanbaka@uncc.edu