Bystander responses to a violent incident in an immersive virtual environment

Under what conditions will a bystander intervene to try to stop a violent attack by one person on another? It is generally believed that the greater the size of the crowd of bystanders, the less the chance that any of them will intervene. A complementary model is that social identity is critical as an explanatory variable. For example, when the bystander shares common social identity with the victim the probability of intervention is enhanced, other things being equal. However, it is generally not possible to study such hypotheses experimentally for practical and ethical reasons. Here we show that an experiment that depicts a violent incident at life-size in immersive virtual reality lends support to the social identity explanation. 40 male supporters of Arsenal Football Club in England were recruited for a two-factor between-groups experiment: the victim was either an Arsenal supporter or not (in-group/out-group), and looked towards the participant for help or not during the confrontation. The response variables were the numbers of verbal and physical interventions by the participant during the violent argument. The number of physical interventions had a significantly greater mean in the ingroup condition compared to the out-group. The more that participants perceived that the Victim was looking to them for help the greater the number of interventions in the in-group but not in the out-group. These results are supported by standard statistical analysis of variance, with more detailed findings obtained by a symbolic regression procedure based on genetic programming. Verbal interventions made during their experience, and analysis of post-experiment interview data suggest that in-group members were more prone to confrontational intervention compared to the out-group who were more prone to make statements to try to diffuse the situation.

Visual realism enhances realistic response in an immersive virtual environment

Participants in an immersive virtual environment interact with the scene from an egocentric point of view that is, where there bodies appear to be located rather than from outside as if looking through a window. People interact through normal body movements, such as head-turning,reaching, and bending, and within the tracking limitations move through the environment or effect changes within it in natural ways.

Visual realism enhances realistic response in an immersive virtual environment - Part2

Does realistic lighting in an immersive virtual reality application enhance presence, where participants feel that they are in the scene and behave correspondingly? Our previous study indicated that presence is more likely with real-time ray tracing compared with ray casting, but we could not separate the effects of overall quality of illumination from the dynamic effects of real-time shadows and reflections. Here we describe an experiment where 20 people experienced a scene rendered with global or local illumination. However, in both conditions there were dynamically changing shadows and reflections. We found that the quality of illumination did not impact presence, so that the earlier result must have been due to dynamic shadows and reflections. However, global illumination resulted in greater plausibility - participants were more likely to respond as if the virtual events were real. We conclude that global illumination does impact the responses of participants and is worth the effort.

Clinical validation of a virtual environment for normalizing eating patterns in eating disorders

The purpose of the present study was to examine the clinical validation of a Virtual Reality Environment (VRE) designed to normalize eating patterns in Eating Disorders (ED). The efficacy of VR in eliciting emotions, sense of presence and reality of the VRE were explored in 22 ED patients and 37 healthy eating individuals. The VRE (non-immersive) consisted of a kitchen room where participants had to eat a virtual pizza. In order to assess the sense of presence and reality produced by the VRE, participants answered seven questions with a Likert scale (0-10) during the experience, and then filled out the Reality Judgment and Presence Questionnaire (RJPQ) and ITC-Sense of Presence Inventory (ITC-SOPI). The results showed that the VRE induced a sense of presence and was felt as real for both groups, without differences in the experience of 'ease' with the VRE, sense of physical space, or the ecological validity assigned to the virtual kitchen and eating virtually. However, the ED patients reported paying more attention and experiencing greater emotional involvement and dysphoria after virtual eating. The results suggest that the VRE was clinically meaningful to the ED patients and might be a relevant therapy tool for normalizing their eating patterns.

Entorn virtual d'aprenentatge per una escola de secundària

Implementarem un Entorn Virtual d’Aprenentatge (EVA) per a l'escola Arrels-Blanquerna de Badalona. Instal·larem un Moodle perquè els alumnes puguin reforçar els aprenentatges adquirits a les classes i realitzar activitats proporcionades pel docent. Farem servir les eines que proporciona GoogleApps per l’elaboració i modificació dels diferents documents que es facin servir, i per la comunicació a través de correu electrònic. Per últim, construirem una pàgina web amb el programari Joomla! que serà útil per penjar noticies relacionades amb el projecte eduCAT1x1 i com a punt d’enllaç amb les diferents plataformes.

PERSONAL(ONTO) : Personalizing the Learning Process in Virtual Environments by means of Adaptive Formative Itineraries based on Reusable Learning Objects and Ontologies TIN2006-15107-C02

Personalization in e-learning allows the adaptation of contents, learning strategiesand educational resources to the competencies, previous knowledge or preferences of the student. This project takes a multidisciplinary perspective for devising standards-based personalization capabilities into virtual e-learning environments, focusing on the conceptof adaptive learning itinerary, using reusable learning objects as the basis of the system and using ontologies and semantic web technologies.

Assessment of emotional reactivity produced by exposure to virtual environments in patients with eating disorders

The aim of this study was to assess the usefulness of virtual environments representing situations that are emotionally significant to subjects with eating disorders (ED). These environments may be applied with both evaluative and therapeutic aims and in simulation procedures to carry out a range of experimental studies. This paper is part of a wider research project analyzing the influence of the situation to which subjects are exposed on their performance on body image estimation tasks. Thirty female patients with eating disorders were exposed to six virtual environments: a living-room (neutral situation), a kitchen with highcalorie food, a kitchen with low-calorie food, a restaurant with high-calorie food, a restaurant with low-calorie food, and a swimming-pool. After exposure to each environment the STAI-S (a measurement of state anxiety) and the CDB (a measurement of depression) were administered to all subjects. The results show that virtual reality instruments are particularly useful for simulating everyday situations that may provoke emotional reactions such as anxiety and depression, in patients with ED. Virtual environments in which subjects are obliged to ingest high-calorie food provoke the highest levels of state anxiety and depression.

How we experience immersive virtual environments: the concept of presence and its measurement

This paper reviews the concept of presence in immersive virtual environments, the sense of being there signalled by people acting and responding realistically to virtual situations and events. We argue that presence is a unique phenomenon that must be distinguished from the degree of engagement, involvement in the portrayed environment. We argue that there are three necessary conditions for presence: the (a) consistent low latency sensorimotor loop between sensory data and proprioception; (b) statistical plausibility: images must be statistically plausible in relation to the probability distribution of images over natural scenes. A constraint on this plausibility is the level of immersion;(c) behaviour-response correlations: Presence may be enhanced and maintained over time by appropriate correlations between the state and behaviour of participants and responses within the environment, correlations that show appropriate responses to the activity of the participants. We conclude with a discussion of methods for assessing whether presence occurs, and in particular recommend the approach of comparison with ground truth and give some examples of this.

Acting Rehearsal in Collaborative Multimodal Mixed Reality Environments

This paper presents the use of our multimodal mixed reality telecommunication system to support remote acting rehearsal. The rehearsals involved two actors, located in London and Barcelona, and a director in another location in London. This triadic audiovisual telecommunication was performed in a spatial and multimodal collaborative mixed reality environment based on the 'destination-visitor' paradigm, which we define and put into use. We detail our heterogeneous system architecture, which spans the three distributed and technologically asymmetric sites, and features a range of capture, display, and transmission technologies. The actors' and director's experience of rehearsing a scene via the system are then discussed, exploring successes and failures of this heterogeneous form of telecollaboration. Overall, the common spatial frame of reference presented by the system to all parties was highly conducive to theatrical acting and directing, allowing blocking, gross gesture, and unambiguous instruction to be issued. The relative inexpressivity of the actors' embodiments was identified as the central limitation of the telecommunication, meaning that moments relying on performing and reacting to consequential facial expression and subtle gesture were less successful.

Is my hand connected to my body? The impact of body continuity and arm alignment on the virtual hand illusion

When a rubber hand is placed on a table top in a plausible position as if part of a person"s body, and is stroked synchronously with the person"s corresponding hidden real hand, an illusion of ownership over the rubber hand can occur (Botvinick and Cohen 1998). A similar result has been found with respect to a virtual hand portrayed in a virtual environment, a virtual hand illusion (Slater et al. 2008). The conditions under which these illusions occur have been the subject of considerable study. Here we exploited the flexibility of virtual reality to examine four contributory factors: visuo-tactile synchrony while stroking the virtual and the real arms, body continuity, alignment between the real and virtual arms, and the distance between them. We carried out three experiments on a total of 32 participants where these factors were varied. The results show that the subjective illusion of ownership over the virtual arm and the time to evoke this illusion are highly dependent on synchronous visuo-tactile stimulation and on connectivity of the virtual arm with the rest of the virtual body. The alignment between the real and virtual arms and the distance between these were less important. It was found that proprioceptive drift was not a sensitive measure of the illusion, but was only related to the distance between the real and virtual arms.

Case-based learning in VTLE: An effective strategy for improving learning design

This article presents preliminary research from an instructional design perspective on the design of the case method as an integral part of pedagogy and technology. Key features and benefitsusing this teaching and learning strategy in a Virtual Teaching and Learning Environment(VTLE) are identified, taking into account the requirements of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) for a competence-based curricula design. The implications of these findings for alearning object approach exploring the possibilities of learning personalization, reusability and interoperability trough IMS LD, are also analyzed.

A methodological approach to identify teacher's ICT competencies in online learning environments in Higher Education

Aquest article pretén descriure el procés metodològic d'identificació i mesurament de les competències TIC dels professors i com a formadors en les TIC en un entorn d'aprenentatge en línia en l'Educació Superior portat a terme en el marc del Projecte Europeu Elene-TLC.La revisió de la recerca en les competències en línia del professor demostra que, en primer lloc, el mètode més utilitzat per a identificar aquestes competències és el focus group. En segon lloc, la tècnica Delphi és la tècnica més utilitzada per reunir el consens d'experts sobre quines són les competències principals per al professor en línia entre els que s'indiquen.La proposta metodològica descrita en aquest document consisteix en la creació de 7 grups de discussió en línia, l'objectiu dels quals era identificar les competències formatives dels professors en línia i les dels professos en línia. La llista de competències obtingudes posteriorment es va oferir als experts europeus que participaven en l'aplicació de la tècnica Delphi. A aquests experts se'ls va demanar que ordenessin les competències d'acord amb el seu grau d'importància.Els resultats mostren que els grups de discussió en línia i el mètode Delphi són les metodologies apropiades per a identificar les competències TIC dels professors universitaris en els entorns d'aprenentatge en línia.

Acting rehearsal in collaborative multimodal mixed reality environments

This paper presents the use of our multimodal mixed reality telecommunication system to support remote acting rehearsal. The rehearsals involved two actors, located in London and Barcelona, and a director in another location in London. This triadic audiovisual telecommunication was performed in a spatial and multimodal collaborative mixed reality environment based on the 'destination-visitor' paradigm, which we define and put into use. We detail our heterogeneous system architecture, which spans the three distributed and technologically asymmetric sites, and features a range of capture, display, and transmission technologies. The actors' and director's experience of rehearsing a scene via the system are then discussed, exploring successes and failures of this heterogeneous form of telecollaboration. Overall, the common spatial frame of reference presented by the system to all parties was highly conducive to theatrical acting and directing, allowing blocking, gross gesture, and unambiguous instruction to be issued. The relative inexpressivity of the actors' embodiments was identified as the central limitation of the telecommunication, meaning that moments relying on performing and reacting to consequential facial expression and subtle gesture were less successful.

Virtual milgram : empathic concern or personal distress? Evidence from functional MRI and dispositional measures

One motive for behaving as the agent of another"s aggression appears to be anchored in as yet unelucidated mechanisms of obedience to authority. In a recent partial replication of Milgram"s obedience paradigm within an immersive virtual environment, participants administered pain to a female virtual human and observed her suffering. Whether the participants" response to the latter was more akin to other-oriented empathic concern for her well-being or to a self-oriented aversive state of personal distress in response to her distress is unclear. Using the stimuli from that study, this event-related fMRI-based study analysed brain activity during observation of the victim in pain versus not in pain. This contrast revealed activation in pre-defi ned brain areas known to be involved in affective processing but not in those commonly associated with affect sharing (e.g., ACC and insula). We then examined whether different dimensions of dispositional empathy predict activity within the same pre-defi ned brain regions: While personal distress and fantasy (i.e., tendency to transpose oneself into fi ctional situations and characters) predicted brain activity, empathic concern and perspective taking predicted no change in neuronal response associated with pain observation. These exploratory fi ndings suggest that there is a distinct pattern of brain activity associated with observing the pain-related behaviour of the victim within the context of this social dilemma, that this observation evoked a self-oriented aversive state of personal distress, and that the objective"reality" of pain is of secondary importance for this response. These fi ndings provide a starting point for experimentally more rigorous investigation of obedience.

How we experience immersive virtual environments: the concept of presence and its measurement

This paper reviews the concept of presence in immersive virtual environments, the sense of being there signalled by people acting and responding realistically to virtual situations and events. We argue that presence is a unique phenomenon that must be distinguished from the degree of engagement, involvement in the portrayed environment. We argue that there are three necessary conditions for presence: the (a) consistent low latency sensorimotor loop between sensory data and proprioception; (b) statistical plausibility: images must be statistically plausible in relation to the probability distribution of images over natural scenes. A constraint on this plausibility is the level of immersion;(c) behaviour-response correlations: Presence may be enhanced and maintained over time by appropriate correlations between the state and behaviour of participants and responses within the environment, correlations that show appropriate responses to the activity of the participants. We conclude with a discussion of methods for assessing whether presence occurs, and in particular recommend the approach of comparison with ground truth and give some examples of this.