Lal Bozgeyikli

VR4VR: vocational rehabilitation of individuals with disabilities in immersive virtual reality environments

This paper presents a virtual reality for vocational rehabilitation system (VR4VR) that is currently in development at the University of South Floridas Center for Assistive, Rehabilitation, and Robotics Technologies (CARRT). VR4VR utilizes virtual reality to assess and train individuals with severe cognitive and physical disabilities. Using virtual reality offers several advantages such as being inexpensive, safer and easily adjustable to different user needs through customization of environments, content and real time interventions. The system is composed of the following components: a virtual reality training area surrounded by an optical motion tracking system, a curved screen with two projectors, a server computer, a remote control interface on a tablet computer for job coaches, and a virtual assistive robot. This paper focuses on virtual reality training for underserved individuals with cognitive disabilities, such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI). We describe six transferrable skill modules and corresponding design considerations. Future work focuses on people with severe mobility impairment, such as spinal cord injury (SCI).

VR4VR: Towards vocational rehabilitation of individuals with disabilities in immersive virtual reality environments

In this paper, a virtual reality for vocational rehabilitation (VR4VR) system for individuals with disabilities is presented. VR4VR aims to enable job coaches to use immersive virtual environments to inexpensively and safely assess and train the job skills of individuals with disabilities. Several key system requirements and challenges are discussed, including the need for virtual “distractor” stimuli to observe user behavior in unexpected situations, the need to make the virtual experience and 3D user interfaces adapt to the specific disabilities of the user, and the challenges in maintaining senses of presence and copresence, especially in individuals with cognitive disabilities. In this work, the chosen population includes individuals with autism spectrum disorder, traumatic brain injury and severe mobility impairment. Using virtual reality enables safe immersion of potential employees in a range of scenarios they may encounter, long before they encounter them in a real job.

Vocational Rehabilitation of Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder with Virtual Reality

In this article, a virtual reality system for vocational rehabilitation of individuals with disabilities (VR4VR) is presented. VR4VR uses immersive virtual environments to assess and train individuals with cognitive and physical disabilities. This article focuses on the system modules that were designed and developed for the Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) population. The system offers training on six vocational skills that were identified as transferrable to and useful in many common jobs. These six transferable skills are cleaning, loading the back of a truck, money management, shelving, environmental awareness, and social skills. This article presents the VR4VR system, the design considerations for the ASD population, and the findings with a cohort of nine neurotypical individuals (control group) and nine high-functioning individuals with ASD (experiment group) who used the system. Good design practices gathered throughout the study are also shared for future virtual reality applications targeting individuals with ASD. Research questions focused on the effectiveness of the virtual reality system on vocational training of high-functioning individuals with ASD and the effect of distracters on task performance of high-functioning individuals with ASD. Follow-up survey results indicated that for individuals with ASD, there was improvement in all of the trained skills. No negative effects of the distracters were observed on the score of individuals with ASD. The proposed VR4VR system was found by professional job trainers to provide effective vocational training for individuals with ASD. The system turned out to be promising in terms of providing an alternative practical training tool for individuals with ASD.

Vocational training with immersive virtual reality for individuals with autism: towards better design practices

In this paper, an immersive virtual reality system for vocational rehabilitation of individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (VR4VR) is presented. VR4VR uses immersive virtual environments to assess and train individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). This paper discusses lessons learned from the testing sessions with neuro typical individuals and individuals with ASD in regards to better design principles. During testing sessions, participants used VR4VR system to practice six skills identified as transferrable and useful in many common jobs. These six transferable skills were cleaning, loading the back of a truck, money management, shelving, environmental awareness and social skills. This paper presents VR4VR system, design considerations for the ASD population and lessons learned from the testing sessions with the aim of giving insight to future virtual reality systems for individuals with ASD.

Poster: Design and development of a virtual reality system for vocational rehabilitation of individuals with disabilities

This paper considers the design and development of a virtual reality system that aids in vocational rehabilitation of individuals with disabilities. The system focuses on three types of disabilities: autism spectrum disorder, traumatic brain injury, and severe mobility impairment. The system allows job trainers to rapidly assess the capabilities of individuals with disabilities, detect the most suitable job for them, and train them in a safe and motivating environment where there are no significant consequences of making errors. Design considerations and research questions that arise throughout development are shared to create awareness of the special considerations involved in developing virtual reality systems for individuals with disabilities.

A Survey on Virtual Reality for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Design Considerations

In this article, state of the art on virtual reality (VR) for individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) with a focus on training/targeted intervention is discussed and reflected upon to explore areas for more future benefits. We present advantages of VR for individuals with ASD. We identify challenges and design issues for future training applications regarding individuals with ASD. We discuss and present design guidelines accumulated in the literature so far, mostly based on observations in user studies exploring the usefulness of VR as a training tool for individuals with ASD, with a systematic literature review. We present and apply a new taxonomy that classifies previous VR works on training individuals with ASD according to immersive and regular (non-immersive) VR systems and types of social, life and safety skills based on a systematic literature review. We explore the common design considerations of the previous VR studies for training individuals with ASD. Finally, based on the systematic literature reviews, we identify key gaps in the research on this topic and present future research considerations.

Virtual Reality Interaction Techniques for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Design Considerations and Preliminary Results

Virtual reality systems are seeing growing use for training individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder ASD. Although the tested systems indicate effective use of virtual reality for training, there is little work in the literature evaluating different virtual reality interaction techniques for this specific group of audience. Individuals with ASD are stated to have different characteristics and perceptions. This requires careful exploration of good design principles in interaction. This paper presents design and preliminary evaluation of interaction techniques for individuals with ASD to be used in a highly immersive virtual reality vocational training system VR4VR [1]. The system includes motion tracking cameras, a head mounted display, real time tracked objects, and several interaction tools such as haptic device and touchscreen. In this system, tangible object manipulation, haptic device interaction, touch and snap technique and touchscreen interaction were implemented for object selection and manipulation; real walking and walk in place techniques were implemented for locomotion. A user study was performed with five individuals with ASD who had no prior VR experience. The preliminary testing results and observations that show the preference of the users with ASD on the implemented interaction techniques are shared in this paper with the aim of contributing to the future studies that utilize VR for individuals with ASD.

Virtual Reality Interaction Techniques for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Virtual reality (VR) systems are seeing growing use for training individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Although these systems indicate effective use of VR for training, there is little work in the literature evaluating different VR interaction techniques for this audience. In this paper, different VR interaction techniques are explored in the Virtual Reality for Vocational Rehabilitation (VR4VR) system and additional data analysis on top of our previously published preliminary results [1] was performed via a user study with nine individuals with ASD and ten neurotypical individuals. The participants tried six vocational training modules of the VR4VR system. In these modules, tangible object manipulation, haptic device, touch and snap and touchscreen were tested for object selection and manipulation; real walking and walk-in-place were tested for locomotion; and head mounted display and curtain screen were tested for display. Touchscreen and tangible interaction methods were preferred by the individuals with ASD. The walk-in-place locomotion technique were found frustrating and difficult to perform by the individuals with ASD. Curtain display received higher preference scores from individuals with ASD although they accepted the HMD as well. The observations and findings of the study are expected to give insight into the poorly explored area of experience of individuals with ASD with various interaction techniques in VR.

Using Immersive Virtual Reality Serious Games for Vocational Rehabilitation of Individuals with Physical Disabilities

This paper presents a system for vocational training and assessment of individuals with severe physical disabilities using immersive virtual reality. The system was developed at the University of South Florida’s Center for Assistive, Rehabilitation, and Robotics Technologies (CARRT). A virtual and physical assistive robot was used for the remote-control skills training. After going through several iterations, the system was tested by a total of 15 participants along with professional job trainers. The results were encouraging in further exploration of virtual reality as a promising tool in vocational training of individuals with severe physical disabilities.

Effects of Instruction Methods on User Experience in Virtual Reality Serious Games

Instructions are an important aspect of virtual reality serious games since they are crucial to understanding what is expected from the user. User friendly instructions can contribute positively to the user experience, while confusing instructions can degrade it. There are various methods of instruction giving. In this study, we examine the effects of four different instruction methods on user experience in virtual reality serious games. The four instruction methods that were explored in our study are 3D animated, pictograph, written and verbal instructions. Eight simple vocational tasks were designed and implemented to be performed in an immersive virtual warehouse environment. A user study was performed with 15 adult participants. Results revealed that animated instructions provided better user experience among the four methods. Pictograph and written instructions shared similar mid-range rankings. Verbal instructions were the least preferred method. In this paper, we present our experiment design, results and discussions of our implications for future virtual reality serious game studies.