AHFE Open AccessHuman Factors in Virtual Environments and Game Design
Editors: Tareq Ahram, Christianne Falcão
Topics: Virtual Environments and Game Design
Publication Date: 2023
ISBN: 978-1-958651-72-8
DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1003860
Articles
Mobile Game Design and Ergonomics: a necessary combination
Games for mobile phones constitute a fast-growing industry, with technologies and business models that explore their portability and facilitated access. The human factors on mobile playing did not follow such a development. With devices using touchscreens to control the game, usability ignored the ergonomics of holding and interacting with handheld narratives in opposition to video game console controllers. This article studies mobile gaming ergonomics to understand how playing with a handheld device changes body alignment, pondering whether game design can lead to or avoid postural injuries in the long term. While console and desktop computer gaming are likely to occur in controlled settings, mobile gaming can happen in varied places and situations. Some games demand players to hold their devices with a single hand, making it difficult to distribute the weight and adjust the grip. Playing while standing up may cause arm and wrist fatigue while gamers try to achieve better visualization. In addition, small onscreen content can also prompt neck stretching, altering the body's axis. Even though the current literature reveals some concerns regarding video games and ergonomics, they commonly focus on the players but not on the game content. Thinking about the latter, is it possible to plan the game to reduce the risk of injuries when playing with a handheld device? As a first step toward a potential answer, the research investigates (1) the body risks when holding a smartphone; and (2) some distinct game features from other mobile operations that can aggravate potential injuries. The conclusions suggest some approaches to game design to reduce the risks in the long term, also attempting to make part of further discussions on ergonomics to make mobile gaming safer for the body.
Wiliam Machado De Andrade
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Addressing the UN 2030 sustainable development agenda and the ESG index with serious games in virtual environments.
The gaming industry has been dominated by the entertainment games since the early 70s and evolved over the years with the technological advancements especially in hardware that allowed more demanding software to be developed. Over the time and in particular the last decade the serious games have emerged with gamified applications on any type of corporate operations. Serious games became a new global market as the gamification benefits radically impact operations performance, competitiveness, and brand awareness. However, a more significant contribution of serious games can be considered their immerse interaction with the users and the opportunities offer to participate and deliver business operations remotely, effectively, enjoyably and rewardingly. Without being the initial target of the gaming industry, serious games seem to contribute much on sustainable development oriented corporate strategies and operations. The integration of Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality and now Metaverstic environments in gamified corporate applications signifies a new era in serious gaming that can be aligned with the UN 2030 Sustainable Develop agenda and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This paper introduces the use of gaming and futuristics interactive technologies applied on the UN SDGs. It explains how each SDG can be supported with such technology and what could be the impact in the society and the economy. Furthermore, it indicates how gamified SGDs applications can impact the ESG scores and points out the added value serious games can offer in organizational efforts to comply with the ESG requirements. The triangulation of the serious games with the UN SDGs and the ESG is powered by the Company Democracy Model as the catalyst for the democratic innovation developed to generate green ocean strategies with sustainable innovation and pink ocean strategies with social innovations.The paper introduces a matrix that highlights the combination of the gaming and futuristics interactive technologies that can be used for the support of each SDG and ESG category criteria. It also indicates ways and provides indicative examples of applications to practically addresses these combinations. The integration of the company democracy model in the developed of such gamified corporate or organizational strategies is empowered with the development of a democratic knowledge-based culture where gaming elements, concepts and techniques derive from the contributions of anyone with fantasy, imagination and creativity. The research conducted is supported with and extensive literature review, cases studies and primary research delivered with survey and interviews from business executives around he worlds and form difference business sectors. The research conducted in based on an extensive literary review, primary research with surveys and interviews but also with the analysis of several case studies to indicate the needs and the trends for the alignment of the gaming technology with the UN 2030 sustainable development agenda. Furthermore, the paper presents the pre and post condition on adopting such a strategy, highlights research limitations, and identifies areas of further research to be conducted for the application and the adaptation of such strategic approaches in vertical organizational sectors and geographic regions.
Panagiotis Markopoulos, Evangelos Markopoulos
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Laterality in Gesture-Based Video Games
Brain lateralization refers to hemispheric dominance for different tasks. Lateralization of the brain and body has been consistently reported in the literature. An extreme right-hand preference has been reported among most people throughout the world. However, gesture control involves coordination among the eye, hand, and foot, and the lateralization pattern of all three is expected to influence such gestures. This study examines the effect of lateral bias in gesture-based video games. The experiment involved 23 students playing a gesture- based game on an Xbox console to determine the interplay of hand-foot lateralization in gesture-based games. The findings are discussed in light of game design and lateral bias in gesture-based games.
Mritunjay Kumar, Braj Bhushan, Ahmed Sameer, Amit Kundal
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Game-based Plant Science Popularization Mobile Application for Contemporary Young People
Nature is the basic condition for human survival and development. The nature-deficit disorder is a phenomenon put forward by American writer Richard Louv, that is, the complete separation of modern urban children from nature in the 21st century. Some experts explain that this desire and ignorance of nature is due to a lack of time to go outdoors, especially in the countryside. In real life, the population of "nature-deficit disorder" has expanded from children to adults. In order to let young people go into nature and understand the thousands of plants in nature, our team wants to design an application to popularize plants through a game-based live experience, so that users can learn more plant knowledge in fun. This design adopts the methods of the questionnaire survey, user interview, and literature retrieval to deeply discover the contemporary young people's understanding of plants, the development status of game-based science popularization apps at home and abroad, and the expected functions of users, to determine the information construction, visual image and interactive experience of the APP. Our team uses Rhino, Cinema 4D, Blender, Unity, Unreal and other software, combined with ergonomics to achieve scene modeling and rendering, to create a more realistic AR experience. The APP can guide users to enter the virtual map, take photos and punch cards through AR switching angles, and randomly obtain passes to unlock other maps. At the same time, users can click to view specific plant data, unlock the plant by completing key tasks such as roots, stems, and leaves, and bring it into the backpack for creation; the app can also game the handicraft which uses plants as raw materials, and guide users to create their own unique imprint. After the usability test, the respondents all believed that this APP could produce a better effect of plant science popularization in the game experience.
Yuqi Li, Sijia Wang, Hongyu Zhang
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Predicting Presence using Environment-Activated Motion in Immersive Virtual Reality
Immersive virtual reality (IVR) has shown promise in being an effective method for a variety of interventions across a multitude of disciplines. Indeed, IVR allows researchers to place participants in realistic three-dimensional environments with a level of control that may not have been feasible in physical environments. Additionally, IVR elicits a higher sense of presence than computer-based interventions. Evidence suggests that presence, defined as the “sense of being there”, is a key factor in the success of these interventions. The relationship between presence and hardware and software factors have been extensively investigated. Behavioral factors have comparatively received little attention. While these system factors are important to investigate, behavioral differences across users may preclude them from engaging in meaningful IVR interventions, regardless of the hardware and software solutions applied. Therefore, this study investigated how an individual’s interaction with the virtual experience may influence their sense of presence. More specifically, we wanted to probe the relationship between environment-activated motion (EAM) and presence in IVR. EVM can be described as any motion within the experience initiated by the user or the environment. This is activated by user-activated motion (i.e., a user looks around) or environment-activated motion (i.e., a virtual dog moves within view). 80 younger adults (22 male, 1 non-binary) completed a 10-minute IVR experience in Vesper Peak using the HTC Vive IVR system. The experience consisted of playing with a virtual robot dog (ex., petting and playing fetch) and teleporting to different areas of the mountain. The session was screen captured using OBS. EVM data were collected by analyzing the videos via OpenCV’s implementation of Dense Optical Flow (DOF). Presence was collected via the IGroup Presence Questionnaire (IPQ, Cronbach’s ⍺ = 0.87). Five data were removed due to corruption, resulting in a final sample size of 75. A regression was conducted with EVM as the predictor and presence as the predictand. The overall model was non-significant (R2 = 0.04, RSE = 5.87, F(1,73) = 12.61, p = 0.054). These results suggest that environment-activated motion may not play a significant role in presence during IVR experiences. Future IVR-based interventions may not have to control for environment-activated motion and can focus more on user interaction and environment design. Further research is needed to look into how environment-activated motion and user-activated motion separately may affect presence in different ways.
Andrew Dilanchian, Michael Prevratil
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Active and Passive Machine Learning Predictors to Build Adaptive Virtual Environments
Virtual environments are increasingly used for assessment and training. While virtual environments offer ecologically valid stimulus presentations, they still follow a one-size fits all model. Technological innovation provides opportunities to transform the virtual environments into a customized experience for each individual user. This allows for the personalization of the virtual environment to the unique capabilities of a user. Active and passive data logging systems provide data necessary for adaptive virtual environments. Currently, most adaptive systems apply either active or passive data collection for building an adaptive virtual environment. The goal of the current research is to identify an optimal methodology for integrating both active and passive data into an adaptive virtual environment that can employ user data for fine tuning stimulus presentations. The framework suggested provides optimal performance parameters for identifying user cognitive and affective states and keeping users in a flow state. The result is a customized experience that is personalized to the user.
Timothy Mcmahan, Thomas Parsons
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
A Cognitive Immersive Room for Intelligence Analysis Scenarios (CIRIAS)
Intelligence can be understood as the timely delivery of actionable information. Our Cognitive Immersive Room for Intelligence Analysis Scenarios (CIRAS) supports foraging and processing information during time-critical scenarios. Intelligence has an ambiguous meaning and could either refer to the ability to learn and reason well using a logical approach or to use a standard procedure to gather and process public and secret information about an adverse entity (e.g., a foreign country) to forecast threats and opportunities. While the latter definition of intelligence roots in military operations, similar methods have been successfully applied in the civil domain, for example, forensic sciences and corporate business decisions. In this paper, we describe the use of cognitive immersive environments for collaborative decision-making using the general procedures of intelligence analysis, especially the concept of the foraging loop by Pirolli and Card (2005). We focus on three use cases, traffic-pattern analysis, bibliographic search, and travel planning, to explain the benefit of virtual environments for the efficient and time-constrained decision-making process. Each of these examples leans heavily on information-foraging behaviors, which have been historically a bottleneck for intelligence gathering. By leveraging the cognitive immersive technology, we will transfer some of the granular search and sort activities to the system, reducing the cognitive load experienced by users during intelligence tasks. The progressive dialog system paired with our map views allows users to plan points of interest across travel itineraries and allows users to plan routes during challenging traffic. Our brainstorming tool supports text source discovery, allowing users to build a knowledge base, and supports bibliography creation.This approach aids analysis in reducing time and time and effort; timely analysis is typically critical in reconnaissance and other intelligence analyst tasks. During collection and analysis, information has to be pulled from various sources and shared among an expert team. CIRIAS possesses matured technologies to source information through personal interfaces such as computer terminals, handheld devices, and dialog systems while also allowing interfacing between groups of people.The latter is important within the shared context between analysts to allow sharing the most relevant information while deferring other information. To bridge this technology gap, we propose a Situations Room environment that enables small teams to pursue intelligence analyst tasks together. In this room, each member can gather information individually while also exchanging and displaying relevant data among each other on large immersive displays. The room provides immersive audio/visual displays to facilitate this as a shared resource while connecting participants to personal devices. The room tracks participants via gestural and acoustic sensors, displays information in spatial relationships to users and extracts speech information and gestures. An existing audio/visual tracking system provides continuous locations of team members using a 6-camera network and a 16-channel spherical microphone. The latter is also used for speech recognition, and assigns input to individual participants for context-based dialog functions utilizing beamforming and tracking. The system can be adapted to different tasks in a flexible manner, which we will explore during our use case discussion.
Shannon Briggs, Jonas Braasch, Tomek Strzalkowski, Bryan Burns, Samuel Chabot, Abraham Sanders, Erfan Al-Hossami
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Co-Design of Service Robot Applications Using Virtual Reality
Service robots have been applied in an increasing number of scenarios, including homes, hospitals, offices, schools, hotels, etc. To ensure the usability of the interaction interface and process in the application of service robots, the design of human-robot interaction in the application of service robots involves various interaction modalities, different robot forms, and different physical behaviors of robots in space, etc. This makes it challenging to have low-cost, high-fidelity prototype methods that support design exploration in the early stages of service robot application design.Currently, many rapid prototyping techniques have been applied to the design exploration stage in the design of service robot applications, such as paper prototypes, storyboards, video prototypes, etc. However, these methods have limitations, including low fidelity and being out of the environmental context. Researchers have also been exploring new prototype methods to meet the design exploration and testing requirements for HRI design. Some studies have explored the use of VR test HRI prototypes, and most of them focus on the technical aspect, and the performance of HRI capabilities. Other studies focus on specific HRI design aspects: interactive mechanism, anthropomorphic appearance, social acceptance, and so on. Approaches focusing on these aspects are not suitable for prototyping and testing the overall interaction scenarios of service robot applications.Based on the characteristics of virtual reality technology, this paper aims to explore how virtual reality technology can be used to support multi-user collaborative design of service robot applications in a virtual environment. To address this issue, this paper proposes a system for supporting collaborative design of service robot applications. The system framework and implementation will be described in detail in the paper. Specifically, the system enables multiple users (designers or stakeholders) to enter a virtual environment in real-time using head-mounted VR devices. Users can select appropriate environment model assets based on the target application scenario and perform bodystorming "on site". Using a modular robot building tool, users can add virtual robots to the space and add or delete functional components, as well as adjust the position, size, and orientation of the components. The system's Wizard-of-OZ module allows users to control the robot's movement and component status. The Graphic UI is embedded into the physical display of the robot via WebView and supports the simulation of the Graphic UI interaction process. After completing the initial application concept ideation and virtual robot design, users can use WoZ and Role-Playing techniques to perform the human-robot interaction process to evaluate and optimize the interaction design. In addition, the recorded video of the performance can also support subsequent design discussions.The system is implemented using the Unity game engine, and users interact with the system using the Oculus Quest headsets and controllers. The design activities case based on the system will be evaluated and discussed to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the system. Further, we discuss the limitations of this work and the future research directions for supporting the design of service robot applications using virtual reality.
Yate Ge, Yuanda Hu, Xiaohua Sun
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
A visual analysis of VR user experience based on bibliometrics Background of the selection
In recent years, User experience of VR products (hereinafter referred to as UEO-VRP ) has received increasing attention. Therefore, it is necessary to further summarise and analyse the current situation of UEO-VRP and existing research results, in order to better apply VR technology to modern science display design and enhance user experience.However, this literature is very voluminous and has strong interdisciplinary properties, involving knowledge from multiple disciplines. It is difficult to objectively analyse the changes in research hotspots and development dynamics in this field by relying solely on traditional literature review methods, and even more difficult to accurately grasp the classical theoretical foundations of VR user experience research. Bibliometrics helps to identify potential patterns and information in the large amount of literature data. Therefore, the UEO-VRP-related literature included in the WOS database is used as the data source in the study, and the retrieved data is visualised and analysed for knowledge structure through scientific bibliometrics.Study design[Data source]: In this study, the Web of Science core database was searched with a search strategy of TS= ((virtual reality OR VR) AND (user experience OR UE OR UX)) and the three major citation indexes, SSCI, SCI-Expanded and A&HCI, commonly used in the WOS database were selected as the search sources. The search results were exported as txt files in the format of "full records and cited references", and articles that deviated from the research topic, missing field information, duplicate data and other interfering articles were excluded. A total of 606 articles were obtained for further quantitative analysis.[Research Methodology]: Bibliometrics refers to the quantitative analysis of various types of literature to discover underlying patterns and information in large amounts of literature data, and was first proposed by Pritchard in 1969. In order to obtain more rigorous and comprehensive data indicators, the study used a combination of CiteSpace (V1.6.18) and VOSviewer (V6.1.R3) software to conduct keyword co-occurrence analysis and literature co-citation analysis on the cited literature, and to map the corresponding scientific knowledge.[Research findings]: UEO-VRP has a general upward trend in the output of time-series papers, but the growth trend is slow. Not many countries/regions, scholars and institutions are prolific, with developed Western countries being more influential in international research; kim, jinmo, kim, mingyu, lee, jiwon, riva, giuseppe and montagud, mario are the core authors in the international community; institutions of higher learning are the main institutions of research, with korea univ, univ valencia, chung ang univ, zhejiang univ and seoul natl univ are the core institutions. The keyword clustering reveals that the knowledge base of UEO-VRP in international research can be divided into three categories: design environment and evaluation, concept and usability, and emerging technologies. An analysis of the hotspot evolution of UEO-VRP reveals that most scholars currently focus on environments, augmented reality and virtual-reality, with social vr, streaming media and metaverse being the next research priorities.
Xinyue Yi, Zhizheng Liu
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Rehabilitation behavior intention of upper extremity stroke patients by IMVT
In recent years, studies have shown that mirror therapy can improve the rehabilitation effect of upper extremity stroke patients. On the other hand, with the advancement of virtual reality technology, relevant rehabilitation medical researchers have widely introduced virtual reality technology into the rehabilitation medical system. This pilot study investigates the effect of the integration of mirror therapy and virtual reality technology (IMVT) with somatosensory game elements on upper extremity stroke patients. Based on research ethics, patients with upper extremity stroke were first consulted about their willingness to participate in the experiment, and the experiment was carried out with the patients’ consents. In this preliminary study, a total of 38 upper limb stroke patients were willing to participate in this ethical research investigation. Thirty-eight patients included 21 males and 17 females, with an average age of 53.8 and 55.4, respectively, are shown a demonstration video, made by the physical health personnel, of how to operate the equipment integrating mirror therapy and virtual reality before participating the experiment. The upper limb stroke patients who agreed to participate in the experiment after browsing the video are given a questionnaire survey on the rehabilitation behavior intention of the patients. The questionnaire used in this research is based on the literature survey of extending the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology II(UTAUT2) proposed by Venkatesh et al. (2012), and the questionnaire items are selected through interviews with rehabilitation medical experts from accredited institutions. The content of the questionnaire included five exogenous variables, namely, "performance expectation", "effort expectation", "social influence", "hedonic motivation" and "game setting", one endogenous variable of "behavioral intention" as well as twenty indicators. The statistical tool PLS-smart was used to perform PLS-SEM (Structural Equation Modeling) analysis on the data. The analysis results found that "hedonic motivation" has a significant impact on "behavior intention" in the SEM model. According to patient interviews and SEM analysis, it can be inferred that the increase in content of hedonic motivation can improve patients’ rehabilitation behavior intentions. In contrast, since upper limb stroke patients still question this novel rehabilitation method, performance expectations, effort expectations, social influence, as well as, game setting, are insignificant in behavioral intention.
Wen-Chi Chen, Chih-Fu Wu
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
An Immersive Virtual Simulation to Assess the Effects of Engaging Tasks on Situational Safety Awareness
Issues about industrial safety during demanding activities are of paramount importance, especially regarding accident prevention. This paper assesses the situational safety awareness (SSA) of two groups of participants in an immersive virtual space according to a task specification. The purpose was to investigate the influence of engaging work exposure on their SSA while conducting plant maintenance activities in the virtual space. The maintenance activity involved changing the engine filter of a gas-powered engine in a computer-based simulation environment. For the procedure, the virtual reality-accident causation model (VR-ACM) comprising 3-D modelling and simulation, accident scenario, and safety assessment was employed for the experiment. Two groups of participants undertook the experiment and provided simulation data and perceptual feedback for the assessment. These groups constituted; the experimental group (n=26) engaged with an air filter replacement exercise and the control group (n=26) was not given any responsibility. Questions based on the Slater-Usoh-Steed (SUS) questionnaire which accesses the three themes of presence was employed for measuring the SSA experienced in the virtual space. The three assessment themes include the potential to perceive hazardous conditions, comprehension of the conditions, and the ability to project lessons in the likely event of the situation arising. This measurement was to evaluate participants’ perception of the virtual space, as the dominant reality rather than their actual location. Despite the substantial levels of presence demonstrated by both participating groups according to the results, the mean evacuation duration of those with the activity (M = 82.42, SD = 18.01) compared to those without the activity (M = 64.58, SD = 18.34) demonstrated a statistically significant difference, t (52) = 3.26, p = .001 in the influence of the working activity to a lesser SSA in the virtual space.
Ebo Kwegyir-Afful, Janne Heilala, Jussi Kantola
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Comparison of One-handed and Two-handed Text Entry in Virtual Reality Using Handheld Controllers
Current consumer virtual reality (VR) systems rely heavily on handheld controllers for input. To this end, numerous methods have been developed and investigated since the emergence of VR in order to improve the user experience for interactions such as gaming or text entry while wearing a head-mounted display (HMD) and using handheld controllers [1, 2]. Although several novel text entry methods have been proposed, there is little research comparing the methods using virtual keyboard interfaces evaluated as experimental conditions. This would allow for a more focused and specialized comparison.Statement of Objective:This work presents the design and empirical evaluation of a split and standard virtual keyboard for text input in virtual environments using handheld controllers. There are numerous applications, including games, for example, entering a gamer’s name or messaging other gamers. An experimental evaluation of two virtual keyboards using VR handheld controllers will be conducted. (Note: As the experiment is ongoing, this abstract is written in the future tense. The final submission will transition to the past tense.) The focus will be on entry speed, accuracy, and efficiency. Both keyboards will be QWERTY-based, but with different organizations. Similar to most physical keyboards, the “standard” keyboard will have all the keys in one arrangement. However, the “split” keyboard will display keys in a split pattern on each side of the screen. For the standard keyboard, users will operate one handheld controller in their preferred hand. For the split keyboard, users will operate one controller in each hand. Thus, a significant point of comparison in the present research is one-handed input vs. two-handed input for the same task. Description of Methods:This research follows an experimental methodology. There will be a total of 14 participants recruited from the local university campus. The study will be a 2 × 5 within-subjects design with the following independent variables and levels:• Keyboard (standard one-handed, split two-handed)• Block (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)The order of testing the keyboards will be counterbalanced to offset learning effects.Five phrases of text will be entered for each block, with phrases selected at random from a standard phrase set [3]. Thus the total number of trials will be 14 participants x 2 keyboards x 5 blocks x 5 phrases/block = 700. The following are the dependent variables in the study:• Entry speed (wpm)• Error rate (%)• Keystroke per character (KSPC)The Unity 3D game engine is used to create the text-input interface installed on the Meta Quest 2 VR headset. Participants will use the Meta Quest handheld controllers to input text. Input uses raycasting, in which the handheld controller casts a virtual line or ray. The virtual ray is positioned on a key on the virtual keyboard, wherein the user presses the trigger on the handheld controller to select the character indicated by the ray.Significance of the Proposed Presentation:The work is significant due to its presentation of the design and experimental evaluation of novel text entry input methods for virtual environments The work pushes the limits of contemporary devices (Meta Quest 2 VR headset) and platforms (Unity 3D game engine) into a design space of particular interest to research in virtual environments.Discussion of Results:Statistical tests, such as the analysis of variance, will be used to identify statistically significant differences between the keyboards for entry speed (wpm), error rate (%), and efficiency using KSPC. Tests for improvement in performance over the five blocks of testing will be included, as well. Regression models will be built using the power law of practice to model the pattern of learning over the blocks of testing. Design implications and suggestions will be offered, as will opportunities for future work. Full details are to be included in the final submission.
Ali Hassan, Scott Mackenzie, Gunho Sohn
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
An Analysis of User's perceptual preferences in Virtual Reality Home Interface Design
The home interface of Virtual Reality (VR) human-computer interaction system determines the consumer's first impression of VR, and it is also the core interface for users to perceive and understand the functional distribution and composition of the entire VR system. However, the current VR home interface design ignores the importance of users' perceptual needs and preferences. This paper attempts to study the relationship between perceptual preferences and design elements in the VR home interfaces by Kansei Engineering. Through the semantic evaluation of the home interface of thirty mainstream HMDs, we analyzed and found that the layout, icon style and the number of cards are the factors that affect perceptual preferences the most. Subsequently, we conducted an experiment on the relationship between these interface design elements and perceptual preferences. Based on the experiment results, it is validated that these interface design elements have varying effects on perception: the icon style has the greatest impact on “future” perception, the interface layout has the greatest impact on “comfort” perception, and the number of cards has the greatest impact on “immersion” perception.
Houran Zeng, Lijuan Zhao, Jing Zhang, Xiaoke Li, Wei Xu
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
The analysis of effect of visual cues in a binary decision making environment
In this study, we plan to answer the fundamental question of what factors affect the human utility function and decision-making strategy. Utility function is an internally assigned value to each state to reflect the satisfaction of moving to that state. Decision Time (i.e., Reaction Time) is the time required for a user to make a decision after observing the current state. The assessment of human decision-making and Decision time has been frequently discussed in the fields such as psychology, neuroscience, and ergonomics.One of the most commonly used experiments to analyze the decision-making process is the choice task, where a set of choices are presented to users, and they need to select one of these choices. For the purpose of this study, we consider only two choices and assign a probabilistic reward to each choice. The task is named “Bias Coin Flip Game”, a web-based coin flip game where one side of the coin is more likely to appear. In another word, the coin is biased. Users are not aware of this bias and are asked to win as much as they can in the course of 250 tries. Probability Learning studies have indicated that after a sufficient number of tries, people are capable of learning the bias. However, the number of tries needed to learn the bias, the time spent between each try (e.g., Decision Time), and the strategy (e.g., matching and maximizing) users would choose to follow are highly susceptible to the visual cues represented to users. We consider multiple factors such as (a) the hidden/unhidden Win rate, (b) showing four last recent coin results, and (c) the order of visual cues. We analyze the effect of these cues on decision-making strategy and decision-making time on different genders and age groups using Factorial ANOVA (i.e., a statistical experimental design to analyze the significance of each cue). Results indicate how each visual cue affects the decision-making strategy chosen by users to design an environment that optimizes the chance of the optimality of the decisions made by the user, avoids convergence to suboptimal strategies, and controls reflection on the utility function. Finally, we suggest the relationship between the complexity of the utility function and the decision time for each environment with different sets of visual cues.
Amirreza Bagherzadeh, Farnaz Tehranchi
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
Training and competency development on virtual safety training
In this paper, we explore cutting-edge technologies that enable virtual safety and control systems, drawing upon both traditional and recent literature on human system integration in operational contexts. Our objective is to enhance mission effectiveness and human well-being through the recommendation adoption of virtualization techniques. To achieve this, we design virtualized missions that facilitate the adoption of operational procedures across different organizational teams. The development of successful personnel simulations demands experience in creating training scenarios in industrial open field environments, leading to improved virtual safety experiences for personnel with reduced training infrastructure needs. Our findings reveal that networking-based virtual training and human system integration, implemented on a system-to-system basis, can support physical simulations. By integrating artificial intelligence, we can enhance data collection and support human operations. Future research should focus on refining training and competency, with a particular emphasis on improving data capture and information processing to bolster human decision-making and performance.
Janne Heilala, Ebo Kwegyir-Afful, Jussi Kantola
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings
The Impact of Interactive AR Technology on the Communication of Intangible Cultural Heritage - Case Study of Chaozhou Opera in China
The dissemination of intangible cultural heritage has gradually become the core of national cultural development and progress, and how to properly protect and inherit intangible culture has also become the main task of the cultural industry. With the accelerated development of artificial intelligence and technology, technology has brought new vitality and vitality to the dissemination of intangible cultural heritage. This study is based on augmented reality technology and uses interactive AR technology to design and practice the problems and challenges in the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage. Digitally transforming traditional Chinese Chaoju culture, breaking through traditional presentation methods, not only achieves the revitalization of intangible cultural heritage, but also strengthens the convenience of dissemination. The article first discovers the current inheritance issues of intangible cultural heritage through research, questionnaires, and literature research, and summarizes the current status of intangible cultural heritage dissemination technology. Then, the application and advantages of AR technology in the dissemination of intangible cultural heritage were explored. Through existing case studies, the design methods and principles of AR technology intervention were analyzed, and the application forms of AR technology in the design of intangible cultural heritage dissemination were sorted out. The direction and direction of design practice were proposed. Finally, taking the Chinese Chaozhou Opera culture as an example, the design practice was verified. Through field visits and questionnaires, the researchers deeply explored the current living conditions and communication difficulties of Chaozhou Opera, and grasped the pain points of Chaozhou Opera communication. After a series of analysis and summary, the cultural elements of Chaozhou Opera are extracted, and interpreted with Chinese traditional Paper Cuttings technology, forming a three-dimensional picture book. Then, based on user experience theory, considering the dimensions of visual presentation, functional attributes, and interactive experience, Chaoju characters are interacted with users in the form of augmented reality through an app. This includes an introduction to the history and culture of Chaozhou Opera, as well as interactive features of Chaozhou Opera characters, enhancing users' interactivity, entertainment, and participation in experiencing intangible cultural heritage. In the design practice, it has explored a new path for the dissemination of Chinese Chaozhou Opera culture, laid a foundation for the development of its digital path, and also verified the design orientation of augmented reality technology in the dissemination of intangible cultural heritage, as well as its advantages and necessity for the dissemination of intangible cultural heritage. At the same time, it has also provided some reference experience for the dissemination of other intangible cultural heritage technologies. On the basis of this design practice, this study will improve the design system of intangible cultural heritage in AR communication, providing certain methods and theoretical support for intangible cultural heritage. The application of AR technology in communication is not limited to the cultural and tourism industry, and most of the technologies of intangible cultural heritage have not yet been further inherited and developed. Therefore, the follow-up research will further appropriately apply the AR technology integration and transformation mode of intangible cultural heritage culture to space display, cultural IP image creation, and other fields, forming a new paradigm based on interactive AR technical communication intangible cultural heritage technology design research.
Mingyan Xiao, Yue Chen, Huaming Huang
Open Access
Article
Conference Proceedings