Acceptance of immersive head-mounted virtual reality in older adults

Hanne Huygelier, Brenda Schraepen, Raymond van Ee, Vero Vanden Abeele, Céline R Gillebert, Hanne Huygelier, Brenda Schraepen, Raymond van Ee, Vero Vanden Abeele, Céline R Gillebert

Abstract

Immersive virtual reality has become increasingly popular to improve the assessment and treatment of health problems. This rising popularity is likely to be facilitated by the availability of affordable headsets that deliver high quality immersive experiences. As many health problems are more prevalent in older adults, who are less technology experienced, it is important to know whether they are willing to use immersive virtual reality. In this study, we assessed the initial attitude towards head-mounted immersive virtual reality in 76 older adults who had never used virtual reality before. Furthermore, we assessed changes in attitude as well as self-reported cybersickness after a first exposure to immersive virtual reality relative to exposure to time-lapse videos. Attitudes towards immersive virtual reality changed from neutral to positive after a first exposure to immersive virtual reality, but not after exposure to time-lapse videos. Moreover, self-reported cybersickness was minimal and had no association with exposure to immersive virtual reality. These results imply that the contribution of VR applications to health in older adults will neither be hindered by negative attitudes nor by cybersickness.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
VR health publication trends. Number of peer-reviewed articles in the Scopus database per year based on the query “virtual reality AND health OR assessment OR treatment OR rehabilitation OR recovery”.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Schematic representation of the study protocol including the order of the test instruments and questionnaires that were administered to participants. In the first session, all participants completed the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, the praxis scale of the Birmingham Cognitive Screen, computer self-efficacy, computer proficiency and attitude towards HMD-VR scales. In a first recruitment phase, participants were allocated to the HMD-VR group (n = 38). In a second recruitment phase, participants (n = 38) were allocated to the control group. The two groups were matched on age, education, gender and independent living status. After exposure to HMD-VR or time-lapse videos in a second session, the user experience of the HMD-VR or time-lapse video condition was measured. Afterwards participants completed a second administration of the attitude scale and completed the simulator sickness questionnaire. A subset of 44 participants also completed the Marlowe-Crowne social desirability scale.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Attitudes towards HMD-VR. (a) depicts the mean score on the attitude scale of each participant on the pre- and post-assessment in the HMD-VR and control group. Each dashed grey line represents the observed scores of one participant, while the black solid line represents the group average. The grey area represents the density plots of the observed mean attitude scores. The results show a positive trend in the HMD-VR group and a stable trend in the control group. (b) depicts the relation between the attitude difference between the post- and pre-assessment as a function of the mean score on the user experience scale for the HMD-VR and control group. Each dot represents the observed mean score of one participant. The results suggest a positive relation between self-reported user experience and attitude difference in the HMD-VR group but not in the control group.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Pairwise scatterplots for all variables included in the path analysis. Shapes represent the three different levels of education, while years of formal education were included in the path model. A low education level corresponds to years of formal education ≤6, mid education level corresponds to years of formal education >7 and ≤12 and high education level corresponds to years of formal education higher than 12.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Predictors of initial attitudes. The standardized regression coefficients for each path are depicted. The association of age with computer proficiency, education and the MoCA were significant. There was no residual association of age and attitudes corrected for computer proficiency, education and MoCA. There was no residual association of years of formal education and attitudes corrected for computer proficiency, age and MoCA. There was no residual association of MoCA and attitudes corrected for years of formal education, computer proficiency and age. The association between age and attitudes was not mediated through education and MoCA. The mediation role of computer proficiency for the relation between age and attitudes was inconclusive.

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