LIVE: the Human Role in Learning in Immersive Virtual Environments

Abstract

This work studies the role of a human instructor within an immersive VR lesson. Our system allows the instructor to perform "contact teaching" by demonstrating concepts through interaction with the environment, and the student to experiment with interaction prompts. We conducted a between-subjects user study with two groups of students: one experienced the VR lesson while immersed together with an instructor; the other experienced the same contents demonstrated through animation sequences simulating the actions that the instructor would take. Results show that the Two-User version received significantly higher scores than the Single-User version in terms of overall preference, clarity, and helpfulness of the explanations. When immersed together with an instructor, users were more inclined to engage and progress further with the interaction prompts, than when the instructor was absent. Based on the analysis of videos and interviews, we identified design recommendations for future immersive VR educational experiences. CCS CONCEPTS • Human-centered computing → Virtual reality; • Applied computing → Interactive learning environments.

Digital Transformations of Classrooms in Virtual Reality

“…The latter work has used head movements as a proxy for visual attention and found that head movements shift between target and interaction partner. This finding partly supports the finding of [58] that the learners' engagement increases when a virtual instructor is presented. However, both works lack eye movement measurements.…”

“…In addition to virtual peer-learners, the presence of virtual instructors may also have an impact on learning in VR. [58] investigated this and reports that learners engaged more with the environment and progressed further with the interaction prompts when a virtual instructor was provided. These works and findings indicate that the styles and types of virtual agents in the virtual environments may have several effects on students' attention and perception during immersion and should be taken into account.…”

The effects of VR in training simulators: Exploring perception and knowledge gain

“…Recently, due to the constraints imposed by the COVID-19 pandemics, the use of VR for training and learning has receiving more attention and the influence of aspects such as users' visual attention and behavior are being explored. Simeone et al [26] found that the presence of a virtual instructor increases the engagement and accelerate the progress of the user during a learning experience. Bozkir et al [27] focused in three different objects-of-interest for measuring attention: peer-learners, instructor, and lecture material.…”

The Use of Virtual and Augmented Reality by Older Adults: Potentials and Challenges

“…Therefore, learning in senior universities, for example., may be organized differently from work-related education (Formosa, 2019). Crucially, VR/AR technology can disconnect learning from physical environments, establish new forms of learning assistance via VR-based lessons, and include gamification elements (Daniela and Lytras, 2019;Simeone et al, 2019;Yoshimura and Borst, 2020). • Health: The use of VR and AR in health promotion, such as psychotherapy and rehabilitation, can help to maintain health and well-being in older adults.…”