Phenomenal regression to the real object in physical and virtual worlds

Abstract

© 2014, Springer-Verlag London. In this paper, we investigate a new approach to comparing physical and virtual size and depth percepts that captures the involuntary responses of participants to different stimuli in their field of view, rather than relying on their skill at judging size, reaching or directed walking. We show, via an effect first observed in the 1930s, that participants asked to equate the perspective projections of disc objects at different distances make a systematic error that is both individual in its extent and comparable in the particular physical and virtual setting we have tested. Prior work has shown that this systematic error is difficult to correct, even when participants are knowledgeable of its likelihood of occurring. In fact, in the real world, the error only reduces as the available cues to depth are artificially reduced. This makes the effect we describe a potentially powerful, intrinsic measure of VE quality that ultimately may contribute to our understanding of VE depth compression phenomena