1. Getting Your Feet Wet: Finding and Defining Immersion
Introduction: The Problem of “Immersion”
John Dawson
Dr. Peter Andras
School of Computing Science
j.d.dawson@ncl.ac.uk
Giving Immersion Context: Virtual Environments, Presence, Flow Experience
Current Findings
References
• The term “Immersion” is used as a catch-all phrase to describe a user experience.
• However, this catch-all phrase is far from being well defined or understood in the contexts in which it is used. Often there are
conflicting definitions of what the term “Immersion” actually means for user involvement in an activity or experience.
• The Aim this Research is to examine what “Immersion” truly is and attempt to create a structured and coherent definition
that can be applied to describing a user experience.
Virtual Environments: The “Virtual Spaces”
• Can be thought of as a fictions “space” in which a user or
participant engage themselves within. Giving the illusion of
displacement to another location [1].
• Are “interactive”, often made up of image displays enhanced
by special processing and by non-visual display modalities, such
as auditory and haptic feedback, to convince users that they are
immersed in a synthetic space.”
• “Virtual Spaces” provide the “rule set” in which a user will
behave and act within; they dictate the “context” in which
activities can be performed and achieved. Example of this can
be seen clearly in Training Simulators such as those employed in
the training of Pilots or Virtual Reality surgery training for
Medical Students and Surgeons. Purely fictitious, high-fidelity
virtual environment for use in real-world applications.
• Need not be made up of complex audio-visual feedback
systems and processing; instead they can be engagement and
involvement in the task at hand [2] [3] or use of imagination of
metaphors and images, such as those presented through media
like books, film and television [4].
Presence: The Illusion of “You”
• Described as a “sense of being there” in a given
environment or activity. Even though the user or
participant may actually be physically situated in another
[5].
• Derived from an individual’s need for self-identification
[6] within the natural world :
• Presence is the complex relationship between the
experiences of the self within the Virtual Environment,
the reaction of the Virtual Environment, as well as the
reactions of others in the Virtual Environment.
• Presence s the “Illusion” when an individual no longer
perceives or acknowledges that the Virtual Environment is
being presented through a medium [7].
[1] Ellis, S.R. (1994) What are virtual environments? Computer Graphics and Applications [Online].14 (1), 17-22. Avaliable: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpls/abs_all.jsp?arnumber=250914&tag=1#Citations
[2] Csíkszentmihályi, Mihály (1975), Beyond Boredom and Anxiety, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
[3] Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly (1990). Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper and Row.
[4] Ricouer, P. (1978). The Metaphorical Process as Cognition, Imagination and Feeling. Critical Enquiry [Online]. 5 (1) 143-159. Available: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1342982
[5] Witmer.B.G. & Singer. M. J. (1998). Measuring Presence in Virtual Environments: A Presence Questionnaire. Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments [Online]. 7(3), 225-240. Available:
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/105474698565686
[6] Heeter, C. (1992). Being There: The Subjective Experience of Presence, Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, MIT Press, fall, 1992. Available: http://gel.msu.edu/carrie/publications/beingthere.html
[7] Insko, B (2003). Measuring Presence: Subjective, Behavioural and Physiological Methods [Online]. Available http://www.scs.ryerson.ca/aferworn/courses/CPS841/CLASSES/CPS841CL09/MeasuringPresence.pdf
Flow Experience: The mental absorption into an activity
• The psychological state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter, the experience itself
is so enjoyable that people do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it. [3] [4]
• Characteristics of Flow Experience are as follows:
Challenging activities that require skills The merging of action and awareness Goals and feedback
Concentration on the task Sense of control The loss of self-consciousness
Transformation of time
• Virtual Environments composed of “Weak-links” and “Strong-links”.
“Weak-links” are methods and features that do not actively engage the individual but instead prompt the individual of the existence of the Illusionary space of the
Virtual Environment.
“Strong-links” are explicit and engaging features that prompt the individual of the changing dynamics and narrative of the Virtual Environment. They are the features
which provide immediate feedback and reward when engaging within the Virtual Environment.
• Virtual Environments displace the participant to another location or “reality”. A tacit or explicit “rule set” of what actions and behaviour are acceptable in the reality
then exists.
• Engaging and participating in behaviour that promotes the “rule set” validates the Virtual Environment, this in turn strengthens and develops Presence within the
Virtual Environment.
• Going against the rule-set undermines the Virtual Environment and the position of the individual within it. By undermining the rule-set, the Virtual Environment loses
validity and is unable to “convince” the user they are immersed within the synthetic space. Without presence, Virtual Environments lose their validity, and doing so
cannot be considered immersive experience.
• Two types of Immersion can then occur.
• “Extended Immersion”, where individuals devote significant psychological and physical resources in developing and maintaining their involvement in the activity over
an extended period of time (greater than that of a flow-experience). Immersion therefore becomes the rewarding experience of this participation, as by being engaged
and involved with the activity, the individual further validates the Virtual Environment, their Presence within it and the experience as a whole. This cycle continues with
immersion experience rewarding the actions and activities of those involved in the activity. This process is known as the “Immersion Cycle”.
• “Volatile-immersion” is characterized primarily by the presence of Flow-Experience; the psychological and physical state in which people as so involved in an activity
that nothing else seems to matter except the experience itself. Flow-experience is the measurement of the duration of the Immersion. “Immersion” is then the
descriptor of the entire encapsulated experience of Flow. This is known as “The Immersion Bubble”. Once a Flow-Experience ends, so does the Immersion in the
activity.
Immersion “Bubble”
Virtual Environment
Stimulus
Attention
Presence
Ruleset
Engagement
ProducesCreates
Forms Contains Defines
Develops
Encourages
Immersion
Validates
The Immersion Cycle