Presence within the virtual reality environment of the international space station

Abstract

Virtual Reality (VR) is becoming an increasingly effective and powerful medium for learning, especially when applied to environments such as the International Space Station (ISS) that requires acquiring situational awareness (SA) and navigation. Research has shown, and continues to show, an encouraging array of positive learning outcomes when applying VR technology to support and improve learning. Findings include observing positive effects on spatial awareness (SA), astronaut navigation, and presence. Additionally, research has demonstrated that learners enjoy their VR experience and acknowledge the potential of VR in enhancing quality of instruction, especially regarding the immersive realism, or presence, that the virtual environment provides. It is argued that this sense of presence encourages and enhances self-paced learning and permits a more student-centered instructional approach. VR has been used in myriad fields and is not just an educational tool. But as an educational tool VR may be used to support only certain types of learning, because the medium may not work for all kinds of learning. That is because presence comprises several characteristics such as sensory effects, distraction, and realism. Also, the sense of presence may be affected by characteristics of a specific environment. To investigate this latter statement the objective of this study was to evaluate four components of presence (sensory, distraction, realism and involvement) while participants navigated through a VR-rendered ISS environment to assess sense of presence and to determine the level of presence in the virtual world of the ISS. The results indicate that when applied to these visual and kinesthetic modes of learning (the other modes being auditory and reading and writing), VR as an instructional tool is not superior to conventional learning. This result was borne out of the assessment of the comparisons between groups when completing navigation tasks and diagram tasks.