Factors and cognitive impairments of cybersickness in virtual reality

Abstract

Virtual reality (VR) gains popularity in the entertainment industry and various professional contexts, such as healthcare, rehabilitation and aviation. Due to the vast technological advances in the last decades, the opportunities to develop applications allowing to experience and interact with immersive virtual environments have increased substantially. Despite its wider dissemination and improved technology, many users of VR still complain about symptoms of cybersickness during and after an exposure to virtual environments, including nausea, disorientation and headache. Cybersickness can be ameliorated to some extent by adjusting characteristics of the VR application and the hardware system but large inter-individual differences in the susceptibility to cybersickness remain. As symptoms of cybersickness can linger for a prolonged period of time after termination of the exposure, manufacturers of VR equipment recommend refraining from driving or using machines until symptoms cease. Still, the effect on cognitive performance remains undetermined. In Study 1 of this project, I investigate the effect of different presentation devices and motion control methods on the degree of cybersickness and determine the influence of experienced symptoms on different parameters of cognitive performance as a VR aftereffect. In studies 2 and 3, empirical analyses of two possible determinants of motion-related sickness related to emotional and cognitive processing of aversive bodily signals are conducted. The project is complemented by a comprehensive literature review exploring correlates and causes of individual differences in motion-related sickness susceptibility. Thus, this project contributes to a deeper understanding of the phenomenon of cybersickness.