Abstract
During head-mounted display (HMD)-based virtual reality (VR), head movements and motion-to-photon-based display lag generate differences in our virtual and physical head pose (referred to as DVP). We propose that large-amplitude, time-varying patterns of DVP serve as the primary trigger for cybersickness under such conditions. We test this hypothesis by measuring the sickness and estimating the DVP experienced under different levels of experimentally imposed display lag (ranging from 0 to 222 ms on top of the VR system’s ~ 4 ms baseline lag). On each trial, seated participants made continuous, oscillatory head rotations in yaw, pitch or roll while viewing a large virtual room with an Oculus Rift CV1 HMD (head movements were timed to a computer-generated metronome set at either 1.0 or 0.5 Hz). After the experiment, their head-tracking data were used to objectively estimate the DVP during each trial. The mean, peak, and standard deviation of these DVP data were then compared to the participant’s cybersickness ratings for that trial. Irrespective of the axis, or the speed, of the participant’s head movements, the severity of their cybersickness was found to increase with each of these three DVP summary measures. In line with our DVP hypothesis, cybersickness consistently increased with the amplitude and the variability of our participants’ DVP. DVP similarly predicted their conscious experiences during HMD VR—such as the strength of their feelings of spatial presence and their perception of the virtual scene’s stability.
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Notes
The sickness experienced when wearing HMDs could be visual, non-visual or even multisensory in origin. Thus, we use the term “cybersickness” to describe this sickness (rather than other terms, such as “visually induced motion sickness”).
Over the last decade, the average effective display lag in VR systems has been reduced by improvements in HMD technology, as well as the use of asynchronous time warping (ATW) and predictive tracking software techniques (e.g., Van Waveren 2016).
Please note that Palmisano et al. (2020) recently reviewed: (1) research on the distinction between cybersickness and visually induced motion sickness, (2) research on display lag effects on cybersickness severity, scene instability and presence, and (3) theories currently used to explain cybersickness (including our own DVP hypothesis).
This study used an adapted form of Oman’s model to quantify the sickness of passengers in a moving vehicle. It appeared to capture important features of the development of this sickness over the course of that drive.
When display lag is present, yaw, pitch and roll head rotations should all generate DVP during HMD VR—with the largest amplitude DVP in each case occurring along the primary axis of the movement (see Fig. 4). When an upright HMD user makes a yaw head movement, most of their DVP should be orthogonal to the direction to gravity. Thus, according to the subjective vertical conflict theory, yaw DVP should be less problematic than the equivalent amplitudes of roll or pitch DVP.
The Oculus Rift CV1 was chosen for this study as it had a higher refresh rate than the Rift S (80 Hz) and the Quest 1 (72 Hz). We note the Quest 2 (Oculus’s most recent HMD) also supports a refresh rate of 90 Hz.
DVP could also be estimated based on orientation differences across all three axes (i.e., 3-DOF DVP), or even based on differences in both position and orientation across these axes (i.e., 6-DOF DVP).
i.e., how they perceived their head to be oriented based on what they were seeing.
It is likely that head amplitudes were larger in yaw because such user movements were easier and more comfortable to make. Oscillatory head-movements were uncomfortable in roll and less symmetrical in pitch.
The main effect of DISPLAY LAG remained significant even after the cybersickness severity data were log transformed, F(5, 100) = 38.233, p < 0.001. The other main effects and the 2- and 3-way interactions for this FMS data remained unchanged under log transformation (i.e., non-significant).
While display lag and head speed were categorical independent variables, the DVP data were not categorical. Therefore their analysis required a regression based approach.
Such findings do not appear to be restricted to the Oculus Rift CV1 HMD. We have observed similar effects in the Oculus Rift S as well as the Oculus Quest 1 and Quest 2 HMDs. However, thus far they have only been examined under a limited number of conditions. It would also be worthwhile to determine how these effects interact with the different distortion characteristics of other HMDs.
These findings could conceivably also be explained based on the effects of display lag on postural instability, which in turn could have induced cybersickness. However, this study was not designed to specifically test the predictions of postural instability theory.
The former explanation assumes that conscious perceptions and cognitions are important for cybersickness—even though motion sickness is often assumed to be the result of automatic reflexes and low-level perceptual processing.
Our assumption is that (unsigned) DVP >> 0 should generally be more provocative for cybersickness than DVP ≈ 0 (as DVP ≈ 0 is statistically much more common in everyday life—i.e., outside of HMD VR). This should be the case when the user first enters HMD VR. However, if they remained immersed in VR all day, then it is possible that this relationship might reverse. That is, the user might become sick shortly after returning to the real world following such a long VR exposure, as they would now be expecting unsigned DVP >> 0 or > 0, but actually experiencing DVP ≈0.
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Palmisano, S., Allison, R.S., Teixeira, J. et al. Differences in virtual and physical head orientation predict sickness during active head-mounted display-based virtual reality. Virtual Reality 27, 1293–1313 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10055-022-00732-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10055-022-00732-5