VIRTUAL AND AUGMENTED

REALITY
ECC4351
Module 4: HUMAN FACTORS

Methodology and terminology, user

performance studies, VR health and safety issues
Applications: Medical applications, military applications, robotics
applications.
HUMAN FACTORS IN VR
 Human factors research
• This consists of systematic studies by multidisciplinary teams of
engineers and applied psychologists to gauge which tasks are more
suitable for users, which user characteristics influence the VR
simulation performance, how VR technology should be improved to
better meet user needs, what kind of designs enhance user
performance, the negative societal impact from the users' misuse of
the technology, and so on
Areas of human factors research in VR

Areas of human factors research in VR

Human Factors Holding Back Augmented and Virtual Reality Adoption

1. Aesthetics
2. Comfort
3. Contextual Awareness
4. Customization
5. Ease of Use
 METHODOLOGY AND TERMINOLOGY
• Definition: VR human factors studies consist of a series of experiments,
performed under very rigorous conditions, aimed at determining users' response
to VR technology, VR technology usability, VR user safety, and the related societal
impact of VR.
• Definition: A trial represents a single instance of the experiment to be performed
as part of a human factors study. A sequence of repeated trials constitutes a
session. Sessions (and sometimes trials) are separated by rest periods for the
participant in the study.
• Definition: A control study divides the subjects into experimental and control
groups. The subjects in the experimental group perform the experiments as
specified in the protocol, while the subjects in the control group do not. They are
used as a basis of comparison.
The main stages of a VR human factors study

The main stages of a VR human factors study

 Data Collection and Analysis
Virtual reality has great advantages compared to classical methods of data collection.

• First, the amount and diversity of data that can be sampled during trials using a VR
system are much larger than those obtained by manual recordings.
• Second, VR systems allow researchers to have a comprehensive view of all subject's
actions while immersed in the simulation and to do so from varying viewpoints.
• Third, the subjects' actions can be recorded online and played back during task
debriefing (as is regularly done in military training).
• Lastly, researchers need not be colocated with the subjects owing to the use of
LANs and WANs and distributed virtual environments.
• Performance measures need to be reliable, that is, they need to be
repeatable and have internal consistency. A performance measure is
repeatable if it returns the same value when measurements are done
over different trials and at different times.
• Repeatability by itself does not assure validity of data. Validity means
the data are truthful to the subject's actions, and is usually
determined by independent expert judgment.
• The last stage of the human factors study is to analyze the data stored
in the experimental database. This data analysis usually uses the
analysis of variation (ANOVA), which determines whether there are
statistically significant differences between data corresponding to
different trials or different conditions.
• Experimental findings are then used to fine tune the interface design,
the control algorithm, or the application features.
• Definition: Task completion time represents the time span between
the subject starting and ending a particular action (or sequence of
actions) constituting the task.
• Definition: Task error rate measures the type, magnitude, and
frequency of errors made by the subject when performing the
simulation task. What constitutes an error is task-dependent and is
established by the experimental protocol.
 Usability Engineering Methodology
• A subclass of human factors research is formed by usability studies,
conducted to determine the ease (or difficulty) of use of a given
product.
• Usability studies differ from general-purpose VR human factors
studies, which are more theoretical and limited in scope to a
particular feedback modality, interaction technique, or system
characteristic.
• By contrast, usability engineering is product oriented, iterative in
nature, and part of the product development cycle.
Hix and Gabbard [2002] developed a
methodology of conducting VR
usability studies. Their methodology
consists of four stages: user task
analysis, expert guidelines-based
evaluation, formative usability
evaluation, and summative evaluation.
 USER PERFORMANCE STUDIES
• Evaluating a subject's performance during interactions with virtual
worlds is a complex endeavor due to its dependence on many factors.
• These include
• the particular virtual world simulated (its complexity),
• the user's characteristics (age, prior computer or task knowledge),
• system characteristics (graphics mode, latency, I/O devices used),
• as well as the task characteristics and interaction techniques used.
 VR HEALTH AND SAFETY ISSUES
• The factors such as interaction techniques, system characteristics,
system responsiveness, and multimodality play an important role in
the effect simulations have on the user's health and safety.
• This can be classified as either direct effects or indirect effects.
• Definition: Direct effects of VR simulations on the user involve energy
transfer at the tissue level and are potentially hazardous. Indirect
effects are neurological, psychological, sociological, or cybersickness
and affect the user at a higher functional level.
 Direct Effects of VR Simulations on Users
• Direct effects of VR simulations affect mainly the user's visual system
(as interactions are visually dominated), but also the user's auditory,
skin, and musculoskeletal systems.
• Direct Effects on the Visual System
• Direct Effects on the Auditory System.
• Direct Effects on the Musculoskeletal System
 Direct Effects on the Visual System
• These occur when a user is subjected to high-intensity light directed at his or her eyes.
• The combination of light intensity and duration of exposure exceeding tolerable limits will result in
retinal burns, and other injuries.
• One example of potential damage is the laser used in miniature wearable displays, which directly
illuminates the retina.
• Continuous viewing without hazard is only possible with Class 1 lasers of 400 nanowatts or less. By
comparison, the simple laser pointer belongs to Class 3a and if directed at the retina, will cause damage
• Another type of light source directed to the eye is the infrared LED used in eye tracking systems.
• It measures the gaze direction of the user's eye by imaging the reflected IR signal using a miniature
camera placed inside the HMD.
• High-output IR LEDs produce signals that can induce cataracts.
• This hazard is compounded by the fact that, unlike lasers, infrared light is invisible to the user. To avoid
injury to the eye, the IR signal needs to be kept extremely low, 7.6 x 10-5 watts according to the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration [2000].
 Direct Effects on the Auditory System.
• These affect the user if the simulation noise level is too high.
• According to the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration,
people should not hear sounds of 115 dB for more than 15
minutes/day.
• If the intensity is reduced to 105 dB, exposure duration increases up
to 1 hour/day.
Direct Effects on the Musculoskeletal System
• These effects relate to the use of haptic interfaces which can apply
high level of forces or push the user's limbs beyond anatomical range
limits.
• These hazards are present in force feedback gloves that pull fingers
backward or in motion platforms that move ankles beyond normal
rotation angles.
• These hazards may result in muscle pain, and other orthopedic
problems. Fractures from fall may also result due to tripping over
cables and tethers so prevalent in today's VR systems
 Cybersickness
• The most troublesome effect of VR simulation on the user is the onset
of cybersickness.
• Definition: Cybersickness is a form of motion sickness that results
from interaction with or immersion in virtual environments. Its main
symptoms are eye strain, disorientation, postural instability, sweating,
pallor, drowsiness, nausea, and (in rare cases) vomiting.
A proposed model for cybersickness

A proposed model for cybersickness

 Neural Conflict
• This occurs when information from several sensorial channels is not in
agreement, as in the case of purposely induced sensorial illusions. In other
instances the sensorial conflict is due to VR's technological limitations and may
trigger the onset of cybersickness
• A universal VR task is navigation. Neural conflicts associated with VR navigation
involve either conflicts between sensorial data from the vestibular and visual
systems or the absence of such data.
• A flight simulator that does not have a motion platform will only provide visual
feedback, but vestibular sensors will not be excited if the head is kept still.
Conversely, a properly functioning motion platform may cause sensorial conflict
when the simulation involves flying through fog, with the visual feedback
remaining unchanged.
 Influence of System Characteristics
• System characteristics such as tracking errors can affect the visual-
vestibular coupling of users wearing an HMD. Such errors also affect
the coupling between the motion of avatars shown in the scene and
the user's proprioceptive system providing sensory information on
limb motion.
• Visual feedback characteristics are also important and potentially
aggravating factors of cybersickness. Eye strain is induced by poor
resolution or images presented through misaligned HMD optics.
LargeFOV displays (such as display walls) can also induce a form of
cybersickness called vection.
• There are other system characteristics that induce sensorial conflicts
which can lead to cybersickness. One important factor is system lag
due to latencies in tracking, communications, rendering, and scene
display. System latencies above 100 msec degrade performance (as
previously discussed in this chapter). Latencies are especially
problematic for tracked HMDs, where the scene will appear as lagging
(or floating) behind head motion. Large latencies cannot be
compensated by the eye image-tracking mechanism (the so-called
vestibular-ocular reflex), which controls visual stability. As a
consequence, the user will overexert the eye muscles (resulting in eye
strain) and may subsequently become nauseated
 The Influence of User Characteristics
• The response to sensorial conflict differs from person to person.
• In other words, we are not all created equal when it comes to
cybersickness.
• Some people exhibit cybersickness symptoms after very little time on
a simulator, while other users of the same system are more
"resistant," and exhibit fewer or no symptoms.
• Thus it is important to consider the role the user's characteristics play
in making some people more prone than others to cybersickness.
• It is widely believed that susceptibility to motion sickness (and thus to
cybersickness) is age-dependent. Susceptibility is greatest between the
ages of 2 and 12 years and declines thereafter, such that at age 25 we
are half as susceptible as we were at age 18. Perhaps the reason for this
age-induced resistance relates to the level of neurohormonal
substances in the body, since some hormones improve the user's ability
to adapt to visuo vestibular sensorial conflicts.
• Generally speaking, female users are approximately three times more
susceptible to cybersickness than male users. Their susceptibility is also
affected by some factors as pregnancy as it affect the level of hormones
in the body
• Regardless of age or gender, users become more prone to
cybersickness after taking medication that affects sensorial and
neural-processing centers.
• Alcohol and drugs are also known to affect the same neural
mechanisms involved in cybersickness and thus to lower a user's
resistance to it.
 Influence of a User's Degree of Interactivity
• When users interact with the simulator through an interface, they
exercise their muscles and move their limbs, and thus the
proprioceptive/haptic system provides additional sensorial data to the
central nervous system. Such data play a positive role in reducing the
effects of cybersickness through accelerated adaptation
 Temporal Aspects of Cybersickness
• These include the amount of time the subject is immersed in the VR
simulation as well as the distribution of repeated exposures over
time.
• Kennedy and his colleagues [2000] estimate that such temporal
aspects have a significant (20-50%) impact on the outcome of
cybersickness
 Adaptation and Aftereffects
• During interaction with virtual environments a user is subject to
sensorial conflict or rearrangement since the relationship between
several sensorial systems differs from normal [Welch, 2002]. The brain
response to this rearrangement is adaptation
• Definition: Adaptation to sensory rearrangement is a semi-permanent
change of perception and/or perceptual-motor coordination that
serves to reduce or eliminate a registered discrepancy between, or
within, sensory modalities, or the errors in behavior induced by this
discrepancy.
• In other words, over repeated VR exposures, the brain learns to consider
abnormal multimodal sensorial relationships as normal, within context.
• Therefore sensorial conflicts are no longer perceived as such by the
brain, and the severity of cybersickness is reduced.
• Over time the user develops a compensatory response to the conflicting
sensorial information and is said to be adapted to the simulation.
Adaptation is facilitated by active interaction, error-corrective and
immediate feedback, incremental VR exposure to the simulation (and
thus to the sensory rearrangement it generates), and the use of
distributed practice
Guidelines for Proper VR Usage
 VR AND SOCIETY
• Mankind's understanding of the importance of technical progress has
made it a continuous, ever-accelerating process (especially in the era
of global communication and economic integration).
• If a product is technically feasible and meets a certain consumer
need, then it will proliferate inexorably. It happened with computers,
with the Internet, and it is safe to say that the same will apply to VR
systems.
• The sociological impact of these applications will be felt in three
areas: professional life, private life, and public life.
 Impact on Professional Life
• In almost any field, the major activities of a profession consist in
learning, design, analysis, realization, and communication. VR may
benefit all these activities and increase overall individual productivity.
At the same time, its networking capability (through distributed
simulations) will allow teamwork and easy expert consultation, thus
improving the quality of the end product.
 Impact On Private Life
• While the positive impact on professional life is clear, the exaggerated
use of VR in private life may accentuate some already existing societal
problems.
• In principle, VR is a formidable communication modality, but it can
also lead to unprecedented individual isolation. The present abuse of
television and video games, so widespread in the young and not so
young, could be further exacerbated by the new technology.
• One can spend a large part of one's time in the pleasure and easiness
of a simulation and thus evade the realities and effort necessary for
education.
 Impact On Public Life
• VR has unmatched communication medium. Communication is by definition
information transfer, and information is at the foundation of our social life. Thus the
effects of VR on public life may be significant
• First, VR may have a beneficial effect on governing bodies by making administrators
more efficient and bringing them closer to their constituents.
• Time delays may be shortened, personnel files made more accurate, communication
improved, etc.
• At the same time, there are risks of depersonalized judicial decisions and invasion of
privacy. In the worst case VR could allow governments to become the feared Big
Brother, and thus very strict information access laws need to be enacted.
• VR may also become a perfect disinformation tool in the hands of governments or
large economic interests