Does interpupillary distance (IPD) relate to immediate cybersickness?

Abstract

Widespread adoption of virtual reality (VR) will likely be limited by the common occurrence of cybersickness. Cybersickness susceptibility varies across individuals, and previous research reported that interpupillary distance (IPD) may be a factor. However, that work emphasized cybersickness recovery rather than cybersickness immediately after exposure. The current study (N=178) examined if the mismatch between the user's IPD and the VR headset's IPD setting contributes to immediate cybersickness. Multiple linear regression indicated that gender and prior sickness due to screens were significant predictors of immediate cybersickness. However, no significant relationship between IPD mismatch and immediate cybersickness was observed.

Gender differences in cybersickness: Clarifying confusion and identifying paths forward

“…These studies offer especially good estimates of cybersickness experienced by men and women. Although this literature search was not done systematically, several larger studies (sample sizes ranging from 136 -1102) support the finding that women experience greater cybersickness than men [10,28,41,42,44,45].…”

“…One type of research question explores whether the gender difference in cybersickness can be explained by a gender difference in a mediating variable [10,44]. As an example of a potential mediat-ing variable, if women have less stable balance (postural stability) than do men, then postural stability might mediate the relationship between VR exposure and cybersickness.…”

“…We conducted a mediation analysis using cybersickness data [10] collected from 178 participants (90 women, 88 men) who played one of three VR games for up to 20 minutes. Cybersickness was measured through the Simulator Sickness Questionnaire (SSQ, [23]).…”

“…Another proposed mediator is whether the VR headset accommodates the individual's interpupillary distance (IPD; i.e., separation between the two eyes) [44]. The distance between the left and right lenses is often adjustable within the headset, but some individuals have an IPD that falls outside the adjustable range, and this is more likely among women than men [10,14,44]. Individuals who fall outside of the adjustable IPD range were found to experience greater cybersickness when measured at 45-60 minutes after ending the VR exposure compared to those who are within the IPD range [44].…”

“…Examples of stimulus-based factors that affect sickness include the content (e.g., games, 3D videos [38]), the locomotion interface (e.g., joystick, teleporting [6,8,27,51]), exposure duration [45], and task workload [40]. Examples of individual factors include prior VR experience [10,19,28], motion sickness history [10,25,45], and gender 1 [10,28,45].…”