JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Although more people are experiencing cybersickness due to the popularization of VR, no official standard for the cause and reduction of cybersickness exists to date. One of the main reasons is that an objective method for assessing cybersickness has not been established. To solve this problem, research for evaluating cybersickness with physiological responses that can be measured in real time is required. Since research on deriving physiological responses that can assess cybersickness is at an early stage, further research on various physiological response is still required.

Objective:

This paper analyzes the effects of cybersickness caused by HMD-based VR on physiological responses.

Methods:

The developed content provided a first-person view to the user while an aircraft moved (with translation and combined rotation) over a city via a predetermined trajectory. In the experiment, cybersickness and physiological response of subjects are measured. Cybersickness was assessed by simulator sickness questionnaire (SSQ). The measured physiological responses were heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, and cortisol.

Results:

From the measurement results, it was confirmed that all SSQ scores increased significantly (p<.05). It was confirmed that the heart rate and the cortisol increased significantly (p <.05). The body temperature increased, but there was no statistically significant difference. The systolic and diastolic blood pressures were significantly decreased (p<.05).

Conclusions:

From the analysis results, the following conclusions were drawn: - Cybersickness causes significant disorientation, and research on cybersickness should focus on factors that affect disorientation. - Physiological responses that were suitable for measuring cybersickness are heart rate and cortisol.