Human-Computer Interaction Group, Department of Informatics, Universitāt Hamburg, 22527, Hamburg, Germany.
VVISE Lab, School of Interactive Arts and Technology, Simon Fraser University, Surrey, BC, V3T 0A3, Canada.
Sci Rep. 2023 May 17;13(1):8053. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-34718-3.
Previous research has shown the positive effects of exposure to real and virtual nature. To investigate how such benefits might generalize to ever-more-prevalent virtual workplaces, we examined the effects of the absence or presence of virtual plants in an office environment in Virtual Reality (VR) on users' cognitive performance and psychological well-being. The results of our user study with 39 participants show that in the presence of virtual plants, participants performed significantly better in both short-term memory and creativity tasks. Furthermore, they reported higher psychological well-being scores, including positive affect and attentive coping, whilst reporting lower feelings of anger and aggression after exposure to virtual plants in VR. The virtual office with plants was also perceived as more restorative and induced a higher sense of presence. Overall, these results highlight how the presence of virtual plants in VR can have positive influences on users, and therefore, constitute important design considerations when developing future working and learning spaces.
先前的研究表明，接触真实和虚拟自然会产生积极影响。为了探究这种益处如何推广到越来越普遍的虚拟工作场所，我们考察了在虚拟现实 (VR) 中的办公环境中缺少或存在虚拟植物对用户认知表现和心理健康的影响。我们的用户研究共有 39 名参与者，结果表明，在存在虚拟植物的情况下，参与者在短期记忆和创造力任务中的表现明显更好。此外，他们报告说在 VR 中接触虚拟植物后，他们的心理健康得分更高，包括积极情绪和专注应对，而愤怒和攻击感较低。有植物的虚拟办公室也被认为更具恢复力，并能产生更高的存在感。总的来说，这些结果强调了 VR 中虚拟植物的存在如何对用户产生积极影响，因此，在开发未来的工作和学习空间时，这是重要的设计考虑因素。
