Department of Psychology, Istituto Auxologico Italiano, Milan, Italy.
Cyberpsychol Behav Soc Netw. 2011 Mar;14(3):99-105. doi: 10.1089/cyber.2010.0100. Epub 2010 Jul 22.
The "mediated sense of presence" is a technology-induced illusion of being present in one (simulated) place when one is actually present in another (physical) place. Typically experienced in virtual worlds, mediated presence is generated by different technological, cognitive, and emotional factors. The aim of this study was to test how to optimise the virtual experience by manipulating some of these factors. Specifically, we tested if an immersive technology and/or a meaningful narrative context influence the users' sense of presence, providing a more compelling experience than a non-immersive and non-contextualized virtual space. Eighty-four students, randomly divided into four groups, were asked to find a blood container inside a virtual hospital in an immersive or non-immersive condition and with or without an emotionally related narrative. Two presence questionnaires and heart-rate variations were used to measure the effects of the four conditions on the users' sense of presence. Results showed a significant effect of narrative, F(8, 73) = 30.346, p < 0.001, and level of immersion, F (8, 73) = 10.913, p < 0.001, and a significant interaction between narrative and immersion, F(8, 73) = 2.062, p = 0.05, both on the presence questionnaires and on the heart-rate variations. Moreover, considering the factors immersion (I) and narrative (N) together, we found that the I-N condition generated the highest level of presence. We argue that both immersion and narrative are important in creating an effective virtual reality experience because they contribute differently to increasing the sense of presence. Immersion increases the place illusion, while the narrative contributes to generating an emotional response and strengthening the subjects' sense of inner presence.
“中介存在感”是一种技术诱导的幻觉，即在实际处于另一个（物理）地点时，感觉自己处于一个（模拟）地点。这种存在感通常在虚拟世界中体验到，由不同的技术、认知和情感因素产生。本研究旨在通过操纵这些因素中的一些来测试如何优化虚拟体验。具体来说，我们测试了沉浸式技术和/或有意义的叙事背景是否会影响用户的存在感，提供比非沉浸式和非语境化的虚拟空间更具吸引力的体验。84 名学生被随机分为四组，要求他们在沉浸式或非沉浸式条件下，在具有或不具有情感相关叙事的情况下，在虚拟医院中找到一个血袋。使用两个存在感问卷和心率变化来衡量四种条件对用户存在感的影响。结果表明，叙事有显著影响，F(8, 73) = 30.346，p < 0.001，和沉浸程度有显著影响，F(8, 73) = 10.913，p < 0.001，以及叙事和沉浸程度之间存在显著的相互作用，F(8, 73) = 2.062，p = 0.05，这两种影响都体现在存在感问卷和心率变化上。此外，考虑到沉浸程度（I）和叙事（N）这两个因素，我们发现 I-N 条件产生了最高的存在感。我们认为，沉浸程度和叙事在创造有效的虚拟现实体验中都很重要，因为它们以不同的方式增加存在感。沉浸程度增加了地点幻觉，而叙事有助于产生情感反应并增强主体的内在存在感。
