This text is part of the special Research section
Using a physiological jacket, researchers from Tech3Lab at HEC Montreal measured the emotions of several visitors to INFINITY, immersive experience presented at the PHI Center.
Walking in space, like astronauts, is a dream shared by many humans confined to planet Earth. The immersive experience INFINITY, which has just ended at the PHI Center, gave many visitors a glimpse of how they would feel if they could make this dream come true. A team of researchers from Tech3Lab at HEC Montreal measured their emotions during the visit.
The Tech3Lab is a user experience (UX) lab. He is therefore interested in the interactions of humans with all forms of technology, with the aim of helping their designers to make them easier and more pleasant to use.
The research project related to INFINITY aimed to measure the emotions felt by visitors to this immersive exhibition inspired by NASA missions, a virtual journey that allowed them to discover the daily life of astronauts in space.
About thirty volunteers took part in the game by agreeing to put on a “physiological” jacket fitted with sensors that measure their cardiac activity, their breathing, their electrothermal reactions and their movements, with great precision.
This jacket, bearing the name of Hexoskin, and more precisely of Astroskin for the model in question, is designed in Quebec by the firm Carré Technologies. It is often used by athletes, and it has been tested, among others, by the Canadian Space Agency in the International Space Station.
The potential of virtual reality
“Virtual reality has the potential to affect all ages,” notes Shady Guertin-Lahoud, master’s candidate in user experience at HEC Montréal and research student at Tech3Lab, who led this research project. For many visitors to the exhibition, going into space was truly a childhood dream. Visitors have been seen in wheelchairs and even someone with a breathing apparatus. People came away very inspired, because this immersion allowed visitors to better understand the place of humans in space. “
“This exhibition makes us realize how virtual reality is a technology with immense potential in many fields, whether in the arts, health or others. Our goal is to understand how human beings feel when they use this technology and to assess their emotional and exploratory journey. “
We therefore use psychophysiology, a discipline that measures the automatic and instantaneous reactions of humans, to help artists and exhibition designers to improve the user experience and make them even more enjoyable or intense.
Measure emotions
However, emotions are a subjective reality, difficult to define with precision. How can we measure them?
“Each person has a perception of their emotions and, in social sciences, we can question them by offering them measurement scales asking them to do an introspection and to graduate their perception,” explains Pierre Majorique, professor at HEC Montréal and holder of the the CRSNG-Prompt industrial research chair in user experience. However, it would not be possible for a user to come back after an hour-long experience and remember all of their emotions precisely, and exactly when they felt them. No human can do that. With the jacket, measurements can be made with great temporal precision to help the designers of the experiment understand the impacts of what they are doing. In addition, algorithms are used which make it possible to standardize the data and to be able to compare them among the participants. “
With virtual reality, it happens that some participants feel an imbalance, or nausea.
“This is what we call the cybermalaise, which is felt by a certain proportion of the population,” explains the professor. For example, when the reality of the user’s movements does not match what he sees, this is where the gagging can occur. But in recent years, virtual reality and the headsets used have improved to reduce the dissonance that exists between the presentation of visual stimuli and what the brain records. These unpleasant effects are less and less present. Let’s not forget that VR is a 360-degree experience, and it’s not easy for designers to script them in space. Part of our job is to help them, through science and data, make those experiences better. “
With the immense potential of virtual reality, researchers trained in user experience and psychology like Shady Guertin-Lahoud are increasingly in demand by the industry. And their discoveries have not finished surprising us.