Harvard Medical School, Department of Ophthalmology, United States.
Technical University of Munich, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Germany.
Perception. 2020 Sep;49(9):940-967. doi: 10.1177/0301006620951997.
Virtual reality systems are a popular tool in behavioral sciences. The participants' behavior is, however, a response to cognitively processed stimuli. Consequently, researchers must ensure that virtually perceived stimuli resemble those present in the real world to ensure the ecological validity of collected findings. Our article provides a literature review relating to distance perception in virtual reality. Furthermore, we present a new study that compares verbal distance estimates within real and virtual environments. The virtual space-a replica of a real outdoor area-was displayed using a state-of-the-art head-mounted display. Investigated distances ranged from 8 to 13 m. Overall, the results show no significant difference between egocentric distance estimates in real and virtual environments. However, a more in-depth analysis suggests that the order in which participants were exposed to the two environments may affect the outcome. Furthermore, the study suggests that a rising experience of immersion leads to an alignment of the estimated virtual distances with the real ones. The results also show that the discrepancy between estimates of real and virtual distances increases with the incongruity between virtual and actual eye heights, demonstrating the importance of an accurately set virtual eye height.
虚拟现实系统是行为科学中常用的工具。然而，参与者的行为是对认知处理刺激的反应。因此，研究人员必须确保虚拟感知到的刺激与现实世界中存在的刺激相似，以确保收集到的发现具有生态有效性。我们的文章提供了与虚拟现实中的距离感知相关的文献综述。此外，我们还介绍了一项新的研究，该研究比较了真实环境和虚拟环境中的口头距离估计。虚拟空间是一个真实户外区域的复制品，使用最先进的头戴式显示器显示。研究的距离范围从 8 米到 13 米不等。总的来说，结果显示在真实和虚拟环境中的自我中心距离估计之间没有显著差异。然而，更深入的分析表明，参与者接触两个环境的顺序可能会影响结果。此外，该研究表明，沉浸感的增加会导致估计的虚拟距离与真实距离对齐。结果还表明，真实和虚拟距离估计之间的差异随着虚拟和实际眼睛高度之间的不匹配而增加，这表明准确设置虚拟眼睛高度的重要性。
