Duration and Exposure to Virtual Environments: Sickness Curves During and Across Sessions

Although simulator sickness is known to increase with protracted exposure and to diminish with repeated sessions, limited systematic research has been performed in these areas. This study reviewed the few studies with sufficient information available to determine the effect that exposure duration and repeated exposure have on motion sickness. This evaluation confirmed that longer exposures produce more symptoms and that total sickness subsides over repeated exposures. Additional evaluation was performed to investigate the precise form of this relationship and to determine whether the same form was generalizable across varied simulator environments. The results indicated that exposure duration and repeated exposures are significantly linearly related to sickness outcomes (duration being positively related and repetition negatively related to total sickness). This was true over diverse systems and large subject pools. This result verified the generalizability of the relationships among sickness, exposure duration, and repeated exposures. Additional research is indicated to determine the optimal length of a single exposure and the optimal intersession interval to facilitate adaptation.

[1]  John H. Bailey,et al.  Side Effects and Aftereffects of Immersion in Virtual Environments , 1994 .

[2]  R. Welch.  Perceptual Modification: Adapting to Altered Sensory Environments , 1978 .

[3]  Michael E. McCauley,et al.  Cybersickness: Perception of Self-Motion in Virtual Environments , 1992, Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments.

[4]  Randy F. Pausch,et al.  A Literature Survey for Virtual Environments: Military Flight Simulator Visual Systems and Simulator Sickness , 1992, Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments.

[5]  Jennifer E. Fowlkes,et al.  Simulator Sickness Is Polygenic and polysymptomatic: Implications for Research , 1992 .

[6]  Norman E. Lane,et al.  Profile Analysis of Simulator Sickness Symptoms: Application to Virtual Environment Systems , 1992, Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments.

[7]  Eugenia M. Kolasinski,et al.  Simulator Sickness in Virtual Environments. , 1995 .

[8]  C. Oman.  A heuristic mathematical model for the dynamics of sensory conflict and motion sickness. , 1982, Acta oto-laryngologica. Supplementum.

[9]  A Graybiel,et al.  Motion sickness produced by head movement as a function of rotational velocity. , 1970, Aerospace medicine.

[10]  R. Kennedy,et al.  Profile analysis of after-effects experienced during exposure to several virtual reality environments , 1994 .

[11]  G. H. Crampton,et al.  Motion and Space Sickness , 1990 .

[12]  Robert S. Kennedy,et al.  Implications of balance disturbances following exposure to virtual reality systems , 1995, Proceedings Virtual Reality Annual International Symposium '95.

[13]  Margaret D. Nolan,et al.  Vection and simulator sickness. , 1990, Military psychology : the official journal of the Division of Military Psychology, American Psychological Association.

[14]  R S Jensen,et al.  Optical information for detecting loss in one's own forward speed. , 1981, Acta psychologica.

[15]  R S Kennedy,et al.  Simulator sickness in U.S. Navy flight simulators. , 1989, Aviation, space, and environmental medicine.

[16]  A Graybiel,et al.  Progressive adaptation to Coriolis accelerations associated with 1-rpm increments in the velocity of the slow rotation room. , 1970, Aerospace medicine.

[17]  Reason Jt.  Motion sickness: a special case of sensory rearrangement. , 1970 .

[18]  C. Oman.  Sensory conflict in motion sickness: an Observer Theory approach , 1991 .

[19]  M. McCauley,et al.  Motion Sickness Incidence Induced by Complex Periodic Waveforms , 1977, Aviation, space, and environmental medicine.

[20]  R. Kennedy,et al.  The effects of visual deprivation on adaptation to a rotating environment , 1965 .

[21]  A Graybiel,et al.  A provocative test for grading susceptibility to motion sickness yielding a single numerical score. , 1970, Acta oto-laryngologica. Supplementum.

[22]  Gary E. Riccio,et al.  Visually Induced Motion Sickness in Virtual Environments , 1992, Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments.

[23]  Frank Biocca,et al.  Will Simulation Sickness Slow Down the Diffusion of Virtual Environment Technology? , 1992, Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments.