Seamless Multi-Modal Transitions between Real and Virtual Environments Using a Physical Door Enhances Presence and User Engagement

Abstract
Transition methods that seamlessly connect real environments (REs) and virtual environments (VEs) using head-mounted displays are known to enhance user experiences, particularly the sense of presence. However, transitions relying solely on visual cues often fall short in making the VE feel convincingly real. To address this limitation, we developed a multi-modal transition method that integrates a physical door, combining tactile (e.g., turning a doorknob), and auditory (e.g., hearing a squeaky sound) stimuli with video see-through augmented reality. This approach seamlessly bridges an RE and a VE, offering a richer, more immersive experience. To validate the effectiveness of our method, we constructed a VE allowing users to move between a real office environment and a forest VE. We hypothesized that our multi-modal transition would lead to a greater sense of self-experience, presence, relaxation, and a higher physical movement level than traditional transition methods like portal and fade methods. Our results demonstrated that the total IPQ (Igroup Presence Questionnaire) scores for the proposed method and the portal were significantly higher than those for the fade method. Moreover, users exhibited significantly greater travel distance and speed with our method compared to the fade transition. These findings suggest that our transition method enhances the sense of self-experience and presence and also encourages more physical movement than the portal and fade methods. This study contributes to the understanding of how multi-modal transition methods can effectively enhance user experiences in a VE and create more immersive virtual environments.
Description

CCS Concepts: Human-centered computing → User interface design; Interaction design theory, concepts and paradigms; Mixed / augmented reality

        
@inproceedings{
10.2312:egve.20241373
, booktitle = {
ICAT-EGVE 2024 - International Conference on Artificial Reality and Telexistence and Eurographics Symposium on Virtual Environments
}, editor = {
Hasegawa, Shoichi
and
Sakata, Nobuchika
and
Sundstedt, Veronica
}, title = {{
Seamless Multi-Modal Transitions between Real and Virtual Environments Using a Physical Door Enhances Presence and User Engagement
}}, author = {
Fujisawa, Takara
and
Hagimori, Daiki
and
Perusquía-Hernández, Monica
and
Isoyama, Naoya
and
Uchiyama, Hideaki
and
Kiyokawa, Kiyoshi
}, year = {
2024
}, publisher = {
The Eurographics Association
}, ISSN = {
1727-530X
}, ISBN = {
978-3-03868-245-5
}, DOI = {
10.2312/egve.20241373
} }
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