The Effect of Visual Design Using Biomorphic Designs on Walking Behavior in Virtual World

Abstract

In recent years, services enabling users to experience walking within virtual spaces have become increasingly available. As a result, there is a growing popularity in services that enable individuals to navigate virtual environments, using virtual reality technology, without physically visiting the places such as museums or shopping malls. When moving in a virtual space, users operate a user interface, such as a controller, and perceive movement visually. Because the feedback to the movement of users in the virtual space is primarily visual, users lack recognition of spatial information, thus making it difficult for them to remember the space and their location. Mirkia et al. (2022) found that visual attention was heightened in spaces incorporating a ‘biomorphic design,’ which mimics living organisms and water, representing a curvilinear and fluid nature, and that it improved the ease of memorizing the space. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the number of biomorphic elements in a virtual space and their effect on the experiments of walking through this space performed by participants. The results of the experiment, conducted in a virtual-maze environment and a shopping-mall-like environment indicated that incorporating a biomorphic design decreased the walking time of the participants in the space. These findings suggest that conducting experiments in a more precise environment can further elucidate the effect of biomorphic design in virtual environments.