Comparing CAVE and HMD Immersive Virtual Reality Exergaming for Adults with Mixed Ability

What is it about?

Inactivity and a lack of engagement with exercise is a pressing health problem in the United States and beyond. Immersive Virtual Reality (iVR) is a promising medium to motivate users through engaging virtual environments. Currently, modern iVR lacks a comparative analysis between research and consumer-grade systems for exercise and health. This paper examines two such iVR mediums: the Cave Automated Virtual Environment (CAVE) and the Head-Mounted Display (HMD). Specifically, we compare the room-scale Mechdyne CAVE and HTC Vive Pro HMD with a custom in-house exercise game that was designed such that user experiences were as consistent as possible between both systems. To ensure that our findings are generalizable for users of varying abilities, we recruited forty participants with and without cognitive disabilities concerning the fact that iVR environments and games can differ in their cognitive challenge between users. Our results show that across all abilities, the HMD excelled in-game performance, biofeedback response, and player engagement. We conclude with considerations in utilizing iVR systems for exergaming with users across cognitive abilities.

Featured Image

Photo by stem.T4L on Unsplash

Photo by stem.T4L on Unsplash

Why is it important?

We addressed the lack of analysis between modern room-scale and HMD iVR systems, especially for adults of different cognitive abilities, through incorporating a unique multi-modal exercise analysis, and focusing on exergaming for health.

Perspectives