Understanding AWE: Can a Virtual Journey, Inspired by
the Overview Effect, Lead to an Increased Sense of Interconnectedness?
Immersive
technology, such as virtual reality, provides us with novel opportunities to
create and explore affective experiences with a transformative potential
mediated through awe. The profound emotion of awe, that is experienced in
response to witnessing vastness and creates the need for accommodation that can
lead to restructuring of one's worldview and an increased feeling of
connectedness. An iconic example of the powers of awe is observed in astronauts
who develop instant social consciousness and strong pro-environmental values in
response to the overwhelming beauty of Earth observed from space. Here on
Earth, awe can also be experienced in response to observing vast natural
phenomenon or even sometimes in response to some forms of art, presenting vast
beauty to its audience. Can virtual reality provide a new powerful tool for
reliably inducing such experiences? What are some unique potentials of this
emerging medium? This paper describes the evaluation of an immersive
installation “AWE”—Awe-inspiring Wellness Environment. The results
indicate that the experience of being in “AWE” can elicit some
components of awe emotion and induce minor cognitive shifts in participant's
worldview similar to the Overview Effect, while this experience also has its
own attributes that might be unique to this specific medium. Comparing the
results of this exploratory study to other virtual environments designed to
elicit Overview Effect provides insights on the relationship between design
features and participant's experience. The qualitative results highlight the
importance of perceived safety, personal background and familiarity with the environment,
and the induction of a small visceral fear reaction as a part of the emotional
arc of the virtual journey—as some of the key contributers to the affective
experience of the immersive installation. Even though the observed components
of awe and a few indications of cognitive shift support the potential of
Virtual Reality as a transformative medium, many more iterations of the design
and research tools are required before we can achieve and fully explore a
profound awe-inspiring transformative experience mediated through immersive
technologies.
The
overwhelmingly beautiful sight of our Earth triggers a profound emotional
response in most astronauts, leading to a cognitive shift, making them realize
the global interconnectedness of all life and feel responsibility for the
future of our planet. This phenomenon was described by White
(2014) and termed the Overview Effect. This experience has
the attributes of self-transcendence and awe (Yaden
et al., 2016) and is a remarkable example of a transformative experience.
Besides the Overview Effect, there are other experiences that have similar
effect of evolving an individual as a changed person and promoting the feeling
of unity or interconnectedness. For instance, such experiences happen in the
context of interaction with nature (Williams
and Harvey, 2001; McDonald
et al., 2009; Tsaur
et al., 2013) or in religious or spiritual context (Keltner
and Haidt, 2003; Levin
and Steele, 2005), as well as mystical experiences, meditation, peak and
flow experiences during high task performance and several other contexts (Yaden
et al., 2017). The emotion of awe is often at the core of
these experiences (Yaden
et al., 2017; Chirico
and Yaden, 2018). Even though the terms “transformative,” “transcedent,”
and “awe-inspiring” experiences are not interchangeable, there is a large
overlap between the phenomena they are describing. For the purpose of the
project described in this paper, as we were aiming for the experience that is
laying anywhere within the cluster of these phenomena, we will be discussing
them together, without drawing a careful distinction between the terms.
Besides
being an enjoyable experience (Shiota
et al., 2011), such phenomena can have short and long-term positive
outcomes: leading to increased well-being (Ihle
et al., 2006; Suedfeld
et al., 2012; Krause
and Hayward, 2015), pro-social (Piff
et al., 2015; Prade
and Saroglou, 2016; Yang
et al., 2016; Stellar
et al., 2017, 2018),
and pro-environmental (White,
2014; Garan,
2015) attitudes, and even improved physical health (Stellar
et al., 2015). The feeling of interconnectedness can lead to the
development of social consciousness, which in turn would lead to pro-social
behavior (Schlitz
et al., 2010). However, despite all the benefits of transformative and
awe-inspiring experiences, they remain rare, inaccessible to some people (e.g.,
due to physical or economic reasons) and could be challenging to achieve at
will. Developing tools that could allow us to create environments that could
reliably invite such experiences to happen would greatly benefit the world on
both individual and societal levels. If we can facilitate the invitation of
transformative experiences even only half of the time, that already would make
such experiences much more accessible, and the tool allowing us to do that,
arguably, would be able to claim itself as a transformative medium.
Virtual
Reality (VR) technology with its controllability and ability to afford sense of
presence could provide us with a unique medium to design for and study
awe-inspiring experiences (Chirico
et al., 2016), making them more accessible to the public and researchers (Stepanova
et al., 2018). The potential of immersive technology to create applications
for positive change has been widely explored in different contexts, see reviews
in Kitson
et al. (2018a) and Riva
et al. (2016). Researchers explored the potential of VR to induce awe in
controlled lab conditions through using immersive videos (Chirico
et al., 2017) and virtual environments (Chirico
et al., 2018a), and were successfully able to elicit a self-reported awe
response in some of their participants. Quesnel
and Riecke (2018) and Gallagher
et al. (2015) have also used virtual experiences of a spaceflight and
evaluated its potential for inducing awe. Even though none of these studies
observed a transformative experience of a similar scale to the Overview Effect
in their participants, they still showed promising results indicating that VR,
as a medium, could successfully deliver experiences that can trigger profound
emotional responses such as awe.
However,
there is still little research on awe, as well as the Overview Effect and other
transformative experiences, that could inspire the design of a transformative
experience in VR. Moreover, a larger body of knowledge needs to be build about
the specific potential and affordances provided by VR for the design of
profound experiences, as well as an understanding of what would someone's
experience of going through such installation be like. As VR technology and
affective design are both relatively new fields, it is important to not only
bring in the understanding of how profound transformative experiences happen
outside of VR as a guidance for the design of the immersive experiences and
assessment of their effectiveness, but to also develop rich body of knowledge
of how such immersive installations are experienced by different individuals.
This study attempts to contribute to this developing body of knowledge by
describing and analyzing personal experiences of individuals going through an
immersive VR installation designed with a goal of awe elicitation and
invitation of a transformative experience. This understanding will be essential
for future assessment of VR technology as a more ecologically-valid approach to
conducting controlled lab studies of complex phenomena and for informing design
strategies, affordances and limitations for the development of profound
positive immersive experiences with transformative potential. VR technology can
not only allow us to “replicate” in a virtual world experiences that are poorly
accessible in real world, such as a spaceflight, but this medium also presents
its own unique opportunities for creating spaces and journeys that can invite a
transformative experience. For instance, technology in itself, with the
vastness of the data it can connect you to, can elicit awe (Bai
et al., 2017). Thus, it is reasonable to explore the virtual transformative
experiences as its own sub-cluster of transformative phenomena with its own
unique attributes and processes, but similar desired benefits such as an
increased feeling of interconnectedness, and the benefits for well-being and
pro-social and pro-environmental attitudes that could follow from it.
In
order to build this knowledge base about the transformative potential of VR and
the phenomenology of individual's experience in a VR installation, we need to
utilize our knowledge of profound transformative experiences to motivate the
design of VR installations and then study the experience it induces as its own
phenomenon. Using qualitative research methods allows us to develop an
understanding of how personal experience is unfolding and what the important
aspects of it are. Then, we can relate that understanding to the attributes of
the design and the desired outcome. Comparing the experience elicited by
different VR installations would provide deeper insights in how different
design elements, as well as the setting and participant's background might
correlate with particular aspects of the elicited experience. Additionally,
relating the personal experiences of participants to the design decisions will
help developers of transformative VR experiences validate their design
hypotheses and intuitions, as well as propose new direction for investigation.
To
achieve that, for this exploratory study we designed an immersive VR
installation “AWE”—Awe-inspiring Wellness Environment (description of
the development including the design hypotheses can be found in Quesnel
et al., 2018b)—that was inspired by the Overview Effect and other
awe-inspiring experiences in nature. This installation is not an attempt of a
virtual replication of an astronaut's experience, but rather an artistic
creation aiming at eliciting an experience that will have some similar outcomes
to the Overview Effect. The Overview Effect is described as a cognitive shift
that includes an experience of awe and feeling of connectedness to
the world, the people and nature (White,
2014; Yaden
et al., 2016; Stepanova
et al., 2018, 2019),
so these were the qualities of the experience that we were hoping to observe in
the immersants going through AWE. At the same time, giving the complexity of
the experiences of awe, self-transcendence, connection and the Overview Effect,
and the complexity of the conditions in which they may occur, at this stage we
couldn't directly test for an effect of singular aspect of the design of the
virtual experience on likelihood of the desired experience occurring. It
doesn't seem to be possible to isolate a singular aspect of the experience that
might be responsible for the desired experience in the immersants. Thus, in
order to form testable hypotheses about the relationship of the design and user
experience, we first need to develop a VR experience capable of eliciting the
feelings of awe, connectedness and cognitive shifts, related to the Overview
Effect; and then build a rich knowledge of the phenomenological experience of
that VR experience, from which new hypotheses can be derived.
In this
exploratory study we discuss the aspects of the experience that the
participants of “AWE” have described and relate their accounts to
the research on the Overview Effect and awe-inspiring experiences. This study
has two distinct goals: (1) evaluate the potential of the current research
prototype, “AWE,” for eliciting some of its desired effects that
have been associated with the Overview Effect; (2) develop a better
understanding of what are the important components of an individual's
experience of going through an affective VR installation designed for awe
elicitation, and how it can inform future system development and hypothesis
formation. To develop a better understanding of the different components of the
experience of a person going through an affective VR installation like “AWE” we
performed in-depth qualitative interviews with participants about their
experience. To evaluate the potential of our “AWE” experience to
elicit awe and ideally lead to a cognitive shift and increased
interconnectedness, besides comparing the thematic analyses of interviews to
existing qualitative research on awe and Overview Effect, we also implemented
two quantitative measures that could be used for assessing components of the
Overview Effect: occurrences of awe measured through goosebumps extending work
of Quesnel
and Riecke (2017) and Benedek
and Kaernbach (2011) and connectedness to nature measured through an
Implicit Association Test (IAT) used in Schultz
et al. (2004).
As this
is an exploratory and largely qualitative study, we were not testing any formal
scientific hypothesis. However, in the process of designing the “AWE” installation,
several design hypotheses were made as a part of the creation
process. Some of these design hypotheses are discussed in our paper describing
the development of “AWE” (Quesnel
et al., 2018b). Even though these hypotheses are not directly tested in
this study, they might have formed some expectations that we had prior to
collecting and analyzing the data, that were informed by these hypotheses.
Additionally, in a separate publication, we have also proposed design
guidelines for a virtual Overview Effect experience based on astronauts'
recollections of it and available research—Stepanova
et al. (2019). Those proposed guidelines have both informed the design of
the “AWE” and might have formed our expectations for the current
study. To minimize our bias in the analyses, we used phenomenological method
that attempts to suspend the researchers' expectations through the process of
epoché (a.k.a. “bracketing”) (Smith
and Osborn, 2004). After the analyses and reporting results, we turn back
to our expectations formed prior to the study and discuss the relation of the
results of this study to the guidelines discussed in Stepanova
et al. (2019) in the section 4 of this paper.
This
paper makes a contribution to several fields: to the field of the VR experience
design (esp. VR4Good—Virtual Reality for positive change) by identifying the
aspects of an affective experience of being in VR that can be supported with
thoughtful design of VR installation; to the field of transformative experience
design by describing possibility for inducing cognitive shifts in VR and how
they might occur; to the field of psychology describing possible methodological
approach for investigating awe, the feeling of connectedness and transformative
experiences, that might be difficult to access, like the Overview Effect.
2.1. Immersive Experience
and Physical Set-Up
Participants
were invited into the study room where there was a separate “tent” section for
the virtual experience and the preparation area with a table and a laptop,
where participants were signing the consent form and doing the IAT. The “tent”
was set up with a 305 × 305 × 211 cm gazebo, that was diagonally separated with
black curtains into the VR and the researcher (from where the equipment was
operated) areas. Inside the “tent” there was an office chair covered with a
blanket (to suggest the atmosphere of comfort) and some pillows on the floor
(to match the virtual environment (VE)); the outside of the “tent” was
decorated with fairy lights, that resemble starry night sky when viewed from
inside, which corresponds to the first stage of the VE (Figure
1). We set up the virtual experience inside the physical tent for two main
reasons. Firstly, to create an explicit entry into the experience space, that
would separate it from the formal study procedures space. As such, the stepping
into the tent was serving as a small ritual, that is proposed as a design
guideline for transcendent VR experiences (Kitson
et al., 2018b). Secondly, the tent was creating a semi-private environment
where participants knew that they were not being directly observed and can be
more immersed and expressive. We believed that these two conditions might be important
for inviting the opportunity of a transformative experience.
FIGURE 1
Figure
1. A participant inside the tent (with the open entrance curtain)
inside the “AWE” installation. The participant is seated on a
swivel chair, wearing an HTC Vive (2016 model, 2,160 × 1,200 total resolution,
1,080 × 1,200 per eye, 90 Hz refresh rate at 110° diagonal field of view) and
noise-canceling headphones on his head, and a goosebump camera on his right
hand. Written informed consent for the publication of this image was obtained
from the person depicted.
The
navigation interface used for locomotion was adapted from Swivel Chair (Nguyen-Vo,
2018), which uses the rotation and leaning of one's body for locomotion
through a virtual space. Participants were sitting on an office chair and
controlling their simulated self-motion by leaning in the direction they want
to go, with the amount of leaning determining the translation velocity in the
direction they were leaning. To rotate, participant turn around on the chair
that can spin 360°. The interface was calibrated for the individual's height.
The immersive
experience “AWE” (Quesnel
et al., 2018b) consisted of three environments: forest, lake and space
(see Figure
2 and a video of the latest prototype http://ispace.iat.sfu.ca/project/awe/).
FIGURE 2
Figure
2. A summary of the virtual journey through “AWE.”. (1) The
immersant finds themselves in a tent at a campsite. (2) The
magical Sprite creature lures the immersant out of the tent to explore the
night forest. (3) Following the Sprite, immersant takes a leap
of faith into the lake, (4) where they descend down passing by
deep water creatures. (5) The bottom of the lake opens into
space where the Earth and Sun appear in a dramatic reveal. (6) After
orbiting around the Earth, the immersant finds themselves back in the campsite.
The
three stages of VE allowed for different amounts of active locomotion:
1. In the forest stage, immersants could freely explore the
environment along the horizontal plane;
2. in the lake, there is a limited range of movement in the
horizontal plane, but the overall vertical direction is directed by descending
within a virtual tube;
3. in space participants were taken on a pre-designed trajectory
with a limited range of movement.
2.2. Participants
As the
main contribution of this exploratory study relies on the phenomenological
analyses of the interviews, we were aiming for the recommended sample size
between 5 and 25 participants (Creswell,
1998). We used purporsive sampling method commonly used in exploratory
qualitative research in order to obtain rich descriptions from knowledgeable
participants (Palys,
2008). A total of 15 participants were recruited through a purposive
sampling method with the help of our partner organization—NGX Interactive, a
local company that creates interactive exhibits for culture industry.
Participants were recruited within the company's employees and clients and are
representing the community of professionals working in the field of culture
industry and technology. We specifically recruited participants who will be able
to provide us with well-informed feedback on the system and its potential to be
used in culture industry for facilitating shifts in worldviews, but they were
naive in terms of the specific details of this study. Additionally, even though
the experience with VR technology varied between participants, they had ample
experience with interactive technologies, and therefore would be able to go
beyond the initial “wow” response, that first time users of VR sometimes have.
We will be referring to participants as P#. Two participants (P07,P15) were
excluded from the analyses as they did not finish the experience due to
cybersickness, resulting in a final sample of 13 (7 females). The ethics
approval was granted by Simon Fraser University Office of Research Ethics (Study#:
2017s0269).
Throughout
the iterative development of the AWE experience we conducted a multitude of
smaller formative user tests with a range of participant populations to inform
the design of the AWE experience. While they generally confirm the results of
the current study, reporting them in any detail goes beyond the scope of the
current study and would not substantially alter the findings.
2.3. Procedure
After
signing the written informed consent form, participants were asked to enter the
tent and sit down on the swivel chair. The researcher explained the set-up
procedure and the navigation, handed the Head-Mounted Display (HMD, HTC Vive)
and the noise-canceling headphones to the participant and assisted with putting
the equipment on. Participants were instructed in case of a mild cybersickness
to close their eyes for a moment, and, if the feeling persists or is strong, to
notify the researcher and they would stop the experience. Next, the researcher
asked the participant to roll up their sleeve and put the goosebump camera
(explained in the following section) on their arm. Once confirmed that the
participant feels comfortable, the second researcher starts the virtual
experience, and the first researcher directs the participant through the
initial calibration process for the navigation, while second researcher starts
the recording of the goosebump camera. Then, the first researcher notifies the
participant that everything is now in order and leaves the tent leaving the
participant in privacy for the experience. After the virtual experience, the
first researcher returns to the tent to assist the participant with taking off
the equipment and sets up for the interview. After the interview, the
participant is directed out of the tent to complete the Implicit Association
Test (IAT) on a laptop (13-inch MacBook Pro). The participant's experience in
the VE was recorded through screen capture and the interviews were recorded
with a GoPro camera. The study took approximately 1 h.
2.4. Evaluation Methods
We have
used a combination of qualitative and quantitative measures to help us address
two goals: (1) understand the participant's phenomenological experience and (2)
to assess the potential of the AWE experience to create conditions in which an
awe-inspiring experience similar to the overview effect (or a degree of) may
occur. As the overview effect is described as a cognitive shift that starts
with an experience of awe and leads to the increased feeling of connection and
responsibility for Earth (White,
2014; Yaden
et al., 2016; Stepanova
et al., 2018, 2019),
we included measures of awe and connection with nature. We didn't include
specific measures of the responsibility for Earth at this stage, as first we
needed to establish that earlier stages of the desired transformative
experience can be achieved.
We used
interviews to collect qualitative data about the participants' phenomenological
experience of going through the VR installation. Additionally, we included two
quantitative measures to assess two components of the Overview Effect
experience: an implicit association test to assess the interconnectedness, and
a measure of piloerection (goose bumps) to assess the occurrences of awe. These
two quantitative measures were included as a methodological exploration in
preparation for future studies, that will use a randomized controlled
experimental design, less in-depth qualitative measures and a larger sample
size. Here, we hypothesized that we will observe a trend indicative of
correlation between the measure of awe and the measure of connectedness (higher
scores on the implicit association test will co-occur with higher number of
instances of piloerection), as in the Overview Effect they are described to
occur together.
2.4.1. Interviews
We
collected the qualitative data through either cued-recall debrief (Bentley
et al., 2005) or micro-phenomenological interviews (Petitmengin
et al., 2009). Both of these methods are designed to help participants get
re-immersed in the past experience and therefor to have more direct access to
different aspects of the experience reducing recall errors that could be
introduced with the use of retrospective measures (Henry
et al., 1994). To further minimize the recall errors caused by the delay
between the experience and the interview, each interview was administered immediately
after the virtual experience. We implemented both methods in order to assess
how they fit into the context of research of affective VR experiences and
evaluate what type of data they will be most effective at yielding. To keep the
study under an hour to avoid participant's fatigue, we used only one type of
interview with each participant: four participants (P02, P03, P04, P09) were
interviewed with micro-phenomenological and nine with cued-recall debrief
methods. Each interview was followed by a short set of general questions about
the experience. The type of the interview administered depended on the timeslot
(determined by the availability of the trained micro-phenomenological
interviewer). When signing up for the study, participants were not informed
about the relationship between the timeslots and interview methods. Each
interview took about 20–30 min.
2.4.1.1. Cued-recall debrief
After
the virtual experience, the researcher would help the participant to take off
the equipment, while the second researcher would turn around the monitor and
load the recording of participant's experience on the screen and set-up the
video camera. During cued-recall debrief (Bentley
et al., 2005) the participant watched the screen capture of the experience
together with the researcher and talked through what was happening at any
particular moment of the experience. The researcher may prompt the participant
with questions to direct their attention to different aspects of their
experience, for example: “What were you doing here?,” “Did you have any
thoughts when you looked up?” or “What did it feel like when you
went in?”; or to direct their attention to a specific behavior observed in
the recording: “You seem to be looking around a little more here, was there
something that caught your eye?”
2.4.1.2. Micro-phenomenology
Unlike
cued-recall, micro-phenomenological interview (Petitmengin
et al., 2009) did not use visual prompts to assist the participant with
re-immersion, and was administered by an interviewer trained in the method. The
interview started with a short practice interview not related to the virtual
experience (discussing a moment from the recent weekend) to give an opportunity
for the participant to get familiarized with the method and what is expected
from them. Then the interviewer asked the participant to identify one or a few
moments in their experience that stood out to them and invited them to focus on
each moment at a time. The interviewer than lead the participant through the
process of the re-evocation of that moment directing their attention to
different sensory and temporary dimensions of their experience.
2.4.2. Implicit Attitudes
We used
the same Implicit Association Test (IAT) for assessing one's connection to
Nature as in Schultz
et al. (2004). This measure is used to measure interconnectedness—the
component of the Overview Effect. This test asks participants to categorize
words in one of the two categories by pressing “E” or “I” key on a computer
with left and right index finger, respectively. In the test trials the
categories are appearing together creating either a congruent or non-congruent
pair (Figure
3). The results are based on response reaction time and accuracy for
congruent and non-congruent category pairs. The categories were Self vs. Other
and Nature vs. Build with 7 blocks of trials.
FIGURE 3
Figure
3. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) screen with congruent
categories pairing and inaccurate response.
2.4.3. Piloerection: Goosebumps and Shivers
Piloerection
observed in a form of goosebump or shivers can be used as a physiological
marker of awe (Benedek
and Kaernbach, 2011; Quesnel
and Riecke, 2017). A “goosebump camera” (see Figure
4) was placed on participant's arm to record a video of their skin during
the experience. The researcher helped participant to put on the camera and
adjusted the focal distance from the camera to the skin for the best clarity of
image. Video recording from the camera was manually synchronized with the screen
recording of participant's experience for future alignment.
FIGURE 4
Figure
4. Custom made set-up of a wearable camera for recording a video
of participant's skin for identifying goosebumps and shivers.
2.5. Analyses
2.5.1. Interview Thematic Analyses
The
interviews were transcribed and analyzed in NVivo. Even though some of the data
was collected with micro-phenomenological interviews, we didn't perform a
micro-phenomenological analyses for this study, but analyzed all of the
interviews through the same phenomenolgical method. First, two researchers
independently went through the transcripts, identified meaning units and
combined them into higher level themes. The two researchers then compared and
discussed the themes, they have identified, to agree upon one set of themes.
Then the researcher went back to NVivo and proceeded with coding. To minimize
the researcher's bias in interpreting the data we used “bracketing” and a
bottom-up coding approach similar to interpretive phenomenology analyses (Smith
and Osborn, 2004) and looked for themes that naturally emerge from the data
instead of coding for the specific themes of interest. We present the summary
of the distribution of all themes, however, in the interest of space, we will
only report in detail on the most prominent and relevant themes.
2.5.2. Implicit Association Test
We
calculated IAT effect D scores of strength of association based on a standard
algorithm for IAT (Wittenbrink
and Schwarz, 2007). D scores have a possible range of -2 to +2. According
to standard conventions we identified the strength of connection in accordance
with the following break points: “slight” - (0.15 ≤ |D| < 0.35),
“moderate” - (0.35 ≤ |D| < 0.65); and “strong” - (0.65 ≤ |D|).
2.5.3. Goosebumps and Shivers
The
video recordings from goosebumps camera were independently manually coded by
two researchers to identify moments of goosebumps or shivers. Moments of
goosebumps are visually evident from hairs erecting, with the appearance of
raised bumps on the skin. Shivers have less prominent raised bumps, but they
are evident from micro-movements of muscles under the skin that visually look
like a wave lifting the hairs up slightly.
The
first two section of the results report on quantitative data, and the following
discuss the interview data. First, we present the interview data based on the
thematic analyses. After, we present the analyses of categories of emotions
related to awe based on a hermeneutical analyses reported in Gallagher
et al. (2015) and compare it to the results observed in Quesnel
and Riecke (2018), that used Google Earth VR.
3.1. Implicit Association
Test
Mean D
score across all participants was 0.46 (SD = 0.54), which indicates
a moderate strength of positive connection between Self and Nature. Nine
participants had a moderate to strong positive connection (M =
0.78, SD = 0.23), two participants had slight or moderate
negative connection (M = −0.39, SD = 0.25), and
two participants had neutral scores (M = −0.11, SD =
0.0015).
To give
context to our observed results, we compared our results to to D-scores
obtained on the same IAT test by Schultz
and Tabanico (2007), who observed an average 0.40 score between 60
undergraduate psychology students and 0.45 between 121 park visitors in
California, we can speculate that possibly the effect of our virtual experience
is similar to the effect of walking in the park in terms of one's implicit
connection with nature. However, the sample sizes and the context in which the
measures were conducted were widely different, and therefor a strong comparison
is not possible.
3.2. Shivers
In this
study we observed one moment of shivers in one participant, when the
participant was observing the sun revealing behind the dark Earth. The Figure
5 illustrates the moment when the shivers occurred.
FIGURE 5
Figure
5. The moment of shivers: aligned recording from the goosebump
camera and screen recording from the HMD showing the Earth scene with the sun
appearing from behind it.
3.2.1. Thematic Interview Analyses
Table
1 summarizes all the themes observed and coded in the data. We are
setting the usability and design related comments aside, as they are outside of
the scope of this paper and will be reported separately. We are reporting on
the most prominent and relevant themes to this paper, specifically: emotions
and feelings, body-centric sensations and embodiment, familiarity and novelty
(role of the personal background) and cognitive mini-shifts. These themes are
highlighted in the Table
1 and their frequencies are summarized in Figure
6.
TABLE 1
Table 1.
Comprehensive summary of themes coded in the interview data, with the prominent
themes reported in this chapter bolded.
FIGURE 6
Figure
6. The number of participants (total = 13), that had statements
coded with themes reported in this paper.
3.2.2. Emotions and Feelings
3.2.2.1. Curiosity and wonder
After
“cool,” “interesting,” and “pretty,” “curiosity” was the most
frequent affect related word used by participants. Curiosity and wonder were
positive emotions driving participants' exploration behavior: “Another sense
of delight: Oh it's a lake! Not knowing what's gonna happen. Do I just look at
the lake? But when I break through the lake its quite a sense of wonder: oh,
that's quite lovely!” (P08). The properties of the environment,
specifically some level of mysteriousness or the “unknown-ness” of it, were
inspiring the curiosity: “I was just curious about the environment. The
environment felt deep. It reminded me the Truman show, where you have the
bubble that you can explore.” (P06), but at same time inducing some level
of fear: “It's really a lot of curiosity and I guess nervousness.”
(P11).
The
novelty and new perspectives were also contributing to curiosity: “I am
enjoying the curiosity. I guess I was more interested in looking at the Earth,
from this vantage point. I enjoyed looking at the space in reference to the
Earth” (P05).
3.2.2.2. Safety and fear
Most of
participants (N = 8) were distinguishing two states in relation to
the environment: comfortable and safe vs. uncomfortable and scary.
3.2.2.2.1. Safety. The majority (N =
11) considered the first environment, the forest, and especially the tent to be
safe and comforting: “the whole set up of the tent, and what I saw here…as a
tent was really, like, I felt safe. I felt the tent provided a safe starting
spot for me to start to going into the outside world.” (P01). When aiming
to achieve a transformative experience in VR, we believed that it was important
to have a safe starting point, to help participants trust the system to take
them on a potentially emotional journey and help them be more open to this
experience. If the medium is not allowing participants to feel comfortable
within it, they will likely be more resistant and closed-off from the
experience. The physical and the virtual tent appeared to successfully serve
that function for most participants. It was also important to conclude the experience
with a safe environment. Here participant describes the last transition and
coming back into the tent: “this again is much more familiar, I do this
every day kind of thing. It was comforting. Probably in a weird way one of the
most comforting parts” (P05). And since participants already developed some
connection and familiarity with that environment, it was even more likely to
elicit a sense of comfort: “Cozy. I felt like I was home, even though it's a
temporary home. Daylight, so it's more comforting” (P06).
3.2.2.2.2. Fear. Fear, was probably
one of the strongest and most interesting emotional reactions observed.
Participants reported being a little “scared,” “nervous,” “uncomfortable,” or
“anxious,” which was usually associated with the jump into or descend in the
water, or, in a few cases, with walking through the dark forest. Both, the act
of jumping of a height and the descend into the deep water was uncomfortable
for some participants: “Then I looked down and I see everything is dark, so
for me it was .. I don't know how to explain.. it was just uncomfortable a
little bit.. somewhere you are in the water and everything is dark and you are
going down” (P09). This was also the transition into the lake where
the locomotion was more restricted than in the forest, that increased the level
of fear:“I know that if I jump into the lake I can get out as fast as I can,
and it's up to me, but I felt like jumping in with the weights attached to your
ankle—I am not in control of this situation and it doesn't make me feel
comfortable. I am being lead. I don't want to be lead” (P06). This
also relates to the role of the sense of agency in the environment, the loss of
which was often undermining participant's enjoyment.
There
were many strong bodily reactions to the jump and descend into the lake in the
VE, that was surprising and in some way profound for the participants: “I
felt a shock. It felt like I was choked. That surprised me. It was not just
like “Oh that was kind of weird,” I did feel like someone poked me or
something. I felt an actual zap to myself, a tension, that I wasn't expecting.” (P05)
The
strategies participants used to cope with this fear were: (1) dissociate from
the experience and bring yourself to the analytical level: “Mentally
overwrote back that this is just the experience.” (P06), (2) find a
comforting point of reference: “There is fish, which is a comforting
reference point in this black void. Trying to follow the light.” (P05), and
(3) just wait for it to pass: “I noticed myself clutching my hands. I am not
comfortable, I am just going to wait it out until it goes away” (P06).
3.2.2.3. Other affects
A
distribution of positive and negative valence affects were observed. Negative
affects were coming through two main sources: (1) usability issues were causing
frustration and inability to explore something of interest was causing
disappointment and (2) some parts of the environment were causing nervousness,
anxiety or fear, discussed in the sections below. Positive affects could be
categorized into the following groups: excitement, inner peace and appreciation
of beauty.
3.2.2.3.1. Excitement. Participants were
describing their experience as “fun,” “exciting,” “wow.” These affects were
often related to the visual and audio attributes of the environment: “The
sun was really exciting, because it is bright. There is music attached to it
obviously, other than just my vision, it was also creating that kind of
excitement. Bright and exciting” (P04); or to an interest and anticipation:
“When I first looked around I was kind of hoping I would get to go in there,
an when I saw that you can, there was a bit of excitement that I can go and
explore the forest around. During that time I was actually looking around a
lot. It was kind of immersive, it was fun” (P03).
Another
aspect of the experience that seemed to elicit excitement was the vertical
dimension, which is opening a novel perspective. Often, when looking up: “I
kept looking up and thinking how far down am I. It was pretty neat, it was cool”
(P13) or down: “So I didn't look down that much, but when I did, it was kind
of fun and kind of scarier than looking elsewhere” (P04) participants would
describe themselves being more engaged and excited. While the lack of vertical
dimension of gaze direction they considered to be the evidence of low
engagement: “I wasn't inclined to look up and down, I was looking more left
and right, more like if you are in museum or something and you're kinda looking
around” (P03).
3.2.2.3.2. Inner peace. Participants
reported feeling relaxed and peaceful. The soundtrack appeared to significantly
contribute to it: “It was very peaceful and soundtrack was nice and reminded
me of nature and being in the forest” (P08), which was also helping with
coping with anxiety from jumping into the lake: “The sound was calming, just
seeing fish and seeing the opening above me made me feel a little more relaxed”
(P09).
3.2.2.3.3. Appreciation of beauty.
Participants described the beauty of the elements of the experience and how it
made them feel delighted or appreciative. Both, the mystical and novel
environments like the nebula: “There is something about it that I can't
define. Because I know these are asteroids and that's probably a planet of some
sort but then the fog is like ‘Awww.’” (P01) and familiar natural beauty of
the forest: “I like lakes, particularly because I can see the mountains and
the sky behind it, so I wanted to look closer <…> I
liked it, I can just sit there and look” (P06), as well as the beauty of
the image of our planet: “It's just visually really striking. And again,
familiar because you've seen images like that. And, the contrast between the
dark and the light is really nice.” (P12)—were all eliciting moments of
appreciation and delight in participants.
3.2.3. Familiarity and Novelty
3.2.3.1. Relation to emotions
The
feeling of safety or fear as well as curiosity and wonder seem to often be
related to the feelings of familiarity and novelty. The first environment of a
campsite in a forest was familiar to most participants, and associated with
positive emotions, which let them feel comfortable going into the environment.
“It's a very familiar place. It's a tent, and there's a bonfire. There might
be other people there. I chose to come here. I chose to be here and setup a
tent and sleep in a tent” (P01). Moreover, throughout the virtual
experience, participants will form new connections with elements of the
environment and use them to bring themselves back to the state of comfort in
the parts that felt scary to them: “…for my one comfort: ‘here is the light,
follow the light, here are some fish, I am being sort of acclimatized
here’—that time helped” (P05)
While
usually familiar environments were providing a sense of comfort, for other
participants, they appeared less engaging. Contrary, novel environments were
stimulating curiosity, wonder and excitement. Here a participant is at the end
of the lake scene: “It felt like ‘oh cool!’—Its not something you would
normally be able to see, where is in the previous environment—I have gone
camping before, so I get it. But here I am thinking this is cool, its really
creative, really beautiful to see the stars through the water”(P08). For
some participants it was easier to accept and get immersed in more novel
environments, they wouldn't have had a concept for, while having a compelling
familiar environment seemed more challenging:
It is neat to explore a perspective on the world that you would
have none of <…> Where is when anything that is too
familiar, because I am so in-tune with how I walk and how that feels, so you
have that disconnect <…> Where in space—I have no
context for that. So okay, this is how I would float in space, fair enough, I
have no other way of knowing it. (P02)
3.2.3.2. Anchoring
The act
of cognitive anchoring to a familiar place was quite prominent, and it was not
only used as a coping mechanism against anxiety and discomfort provoking
environments, but also to orient oneself: “I saw the sun and recognized it,
and quickly after that I saw the Earth, so there was a relation there—I knew
where I was for the first time in the experience. Not that I haven't been in a
tent before, that was quite familiar. But there I for sure knew where I was.” (P04)
and to connect with the environment in a more meaningful way: “This is kinda
of an interesting angle of North America and South America. I have a colleague,
who is working in Columbia right now, so I am trying …I am putting real people
I know” (P05).
3.2.3.3. Importance of individual variables
and background
We were
surprised to observe polarly different responses from our participants within
such a fairly simple experience, with a fairly consisted journey. Each of the
stages and transitions in the experience has produced opposing responses from
love to hate and from relaxation and peacefulness to excitement or fear. This
distribution of reactions has stressed the significance of participant's
individual background.
The
lake environment was the most striking example of opposing experiences
participants were having and its relation to their background. One participant
describes her delight in that stage: “I just love the water, and so going
into the water was quite delightful. Happiness, familiarity, for me not too
calm, but connectedness to nature in that way” (P08). While another
participant had a very different reaction to the same environment: “A little
worried. I don't like deep water. A little anxious. Okay, we got to go over to
the lake, I hope we stay above it” (P06). Transition into the lake as well,
which was reported to be one of the most memorable moments by most
participants, elicited opposing reaction depending on personal background: an
uncomfortable anticipation and anxiety by one participant: “coming down the
little ledge to go in the water. that was kind of .. I was a little bit
hesitant before, because I don't normally like jumping into the water from
height. Or jumping from height in general. That feeling scares me a little bit” (P09),
while another participant had a positive anticipation and excitement coming up
to that transitions: “I realized that okay, I am going down to the water, so
perfect. This is great. <…> I was a little stoked, cause
thats the direction where I wanted to go <…> I was a
little bit timed here: Am I supposed to jump in here? <…> then
I went for it” (P11), this participant later mentioned being a
cliff-jumper.
Another
important influence on the experience was coming from the video-games
experience, that participants had, that was both helping them with navigation:
“I have a little bit of a gaming background so I am sort of very comfortable
with this first-person movement through virtual space” (P13), and setting
up an expectation to have a goal: “ it reminded me of old video games
where there is like a mission or something, I wouldn't necessarily do that
mission and I would end up going off somewhere else” (P10).
3.2.4. Body-Centric Sensations and Embodiment
3.2.4.1. Jump into the water
As
discussed in the section on safety and fear, the transition into the water
environment, that was inviting participants to jump into the lake, was inducing
strong reactions in participants' bodies. They were describing clutching their
hands, tensing up their muscles and holding their breath: “all your muscles
constrict, or contract, so it's almost like you are trying to hold yourself
tight, so when you get that cold, you can release it once you hit the water”
(P02). This tension was often followed by a release and relaxation, when
“hitting the water”: “the body just kind of tense up, and you just kind of
…just kind of muscles release …As soon as I got in the water” (P09).
3.2.4.2. Weightlessness
Interestingly,
that feeling of release might have facilitated the feeling of floating or
weightlessness. Here a participant describes the moment when that release
happened:
That's weird, because, on the ground, up to that transition, I
am super conscious of how I am sitting on a chair, and that kind of leaning
forward is feeling a little awkward…But in that second I didn't feel the…And
that's what I kind of loved too, is how, I had no idea you could reproduce
that, give that sense that you are weightless, suddenly I wasn't conscious of
my body pressing into the Earth. (P02)
For a
different participant a similar moment of release leading to the sense of
weightlessness happened in the transition into the space: “When I was in the
water I felt like I was not in control and I was weighted down, like if I had
weights around my ankles, where is when I was transitioning into the night sky
it felt like the opposite: the weights are off the ankles, you are weightless” (P06).
This participant was afraid of the water environment, and even though that
transition into space produced less internal bodily responses for most
participants than the transition into water, the psychological release of
letting go of the fear still lead this participant to experience the illusion
of weightlessness.
It was
interesting to observe that 6 participants have mentioned floating or the
feeling of weightlessness. It might not have been a strong bodily feeling for
everyone, but it is encouraging to see that even with a simple hands-free
leaning-based interface through a design of the storyline and the visuals, we
were able to elicit some level of the feeling of weightlessness without
submersing participants in a flotation tank [which would be a more literal
induction of the feeling of weightlessness, for instance, planned by SpaceVR
for 2018 Burning Man festival (Bonasio,
2018)].
3.2.4.3. Connect and disconnect between mind
and body
Imaginative
immersion in combination with sensory immersion (Ermi
and Mäyrä, 2005) when achieved successfully creates a condition in which
participants experience a disconnect between their mind and body. Participants
discuss these moments of disconnect, and having their perceptions overridden by
their imagination as the optimal moments of their experience: “It was a bit
more of the imagination and just like the feeling of being in warm water and
submerging and yet not worrying about the panic of not being able to breath,
and just something about that, that I quite liked. And maybe it's because I
didn't feel this [points at different parts of his body], right?” (P02).
While the moments, in which the conflict between the physical body position and
the virtual position became apparent, lead to frustration and disappointment: “You
start unpacking, okay, so you have this goggles, the audio here, and my arms
and legs just feel static and crossed, how does that connect? Because that
feels weird, when you come back to your body and then realize that it is a
stagnate lump going through this [points at where HMD would have
been]” (P02). It would be interesting to investigate how this
connect/disconnect transitions are being triggered. In case of this
participant, he had this desired disconnect during the lake stage that was
initiated by a visceral jump into the lake and then “something broke the
spell” (P02) when transition into the space happened. For him, the
transition into the space came as a surprise and did not make sense. For a
different participant, the conflict was the result of not having an avatar
representation in the VE: “I felt a bit disconnected from my body, because
when I look down I don't see my body, and usually its there, obviously”
(P04).
3.2.4.4. Reflexes and vection
Vection
(an illusion of self-motion) and reflexes are often perceived as an indicator
of how immersive and “believable” the experience was by participants.
For
example, a participant describes descending down in the lake: “I see the
sparkles, <…> I realized that they are kind of like
surrounding me, that's when I really got the sense of the descent down. The
closest I can compare it to is when you are going down a roller coaster, but it
wasn't that intense, it was more calm kind of feeling” (P03) and then
going into space: “As soon as the movement started, it kind of again felt a
bit more immersive, the floating feeling came back again” (P03). The lack
of self-motion illusion for some participants in space combined with restricted
locomotion might have also contributed to some of them feeling as if they are
watching a movie instead of participating.
Sometimes,
participants would also report having a reflex in reaction to an event in the
VE: for example, when the sun appeared, a participant was surprised and
reported: “I am pretty sure I jumped.” (P05) while another participant
mentioned: “I found the sun pretty bright, almost wanted to put my hand up.
But yeah, this is neat.” (P10). While putting the hand up to protect one's
eyes wouldn't have worked with an HMD, a different participant adopted her
reflexes from diving to the VR equipment: “because I'm a diver I felt like
I'm descending, there was one point were I adjusted my face but it's a bit like
adjusting your regulator.” (P14). This type of behavior could potentially
indicate how “real” the experience was for the participants at that moment.
This
“realness” and “being there” of the experience, that is indicated by
multidimensional responses, including your internal body feelings and actions,
are likely an important precursor to the possibility of transformative experience
that could lead to cognitive shifts. For instance “presence,” which is often
described as the feeling of “realness” or “being there” in a virtual experience
was shown to correlate with a stronger effect of the virtual experience on the
following real-world behavior (Fox
et al., 2009; Rosenberg
et al., 2013).
3.2.5. Cognitive Mini-Shifts
As the
ultimate goal of this project is to evaluate if VR experiences can be designed
to elicit positive cognitive shifts similar to the Overview Effect and other
awe-inspiring transformative experiences, we were excited (and a little
surprised) to see some indication of some minor cognitive shifts voluntarily
described in the interviews. Participants themselves were also intrigued by the
shift in perspective resulted from their experience, even when the shift was in
the perception of seemingly simple concepts:
I kinda compared that sort of spatial environment that I was in
with all of the representations of space that we get used to, which is a very
2D item, the solar system prospective. And that difference, that being in it,
and that way how it altered my sense of that relational space of one celestial
body to another, that was really cool actually how it changed something in my
mind slightly. (P13)
3.2.5.1. Day and night
Four
participants found the concept of day and night happening at the same time on
different sides of the globe, that was observable in the experience when
traveling around the Earth, very interesting. Even though they are
intellectually familiar with this idea, seeing it from the first person
perspective was a somewhat “eye-opening” experience. Participant reflects on
her mental process of coming to that realization:
To realize that it is so easy to look at something through one
lens, but when, if you are exposed to it in a different way, then something
that was so familiar to you …can give you such a different perspective.
Something as simple as that sun is not shinning on the other side of the half
of the world, means its night time, and it's so simple. And I studied, moons,
and tides and sunrises and sunsets, but never thought about it quite so simply:
that sun is shining on one side but not the other side. (P08)
3.2.5.2. Vastness
Vastness
can be better described as part of the perceptual experience that could lead to
a cognitive shift (rather than a shift in itself), but as it is considered to
be the precursor for the experience of awe (Keltner
and Haidt, 2003) and cognitive shift of perspective (Gaggioli,
2016), they are closely related. A participant, who works at an aquarium
described:
I remember thinking that the Pacific ocean is so big and for a
while I thought that I am not seeing things correctly. Which is funny, because
I <…> know that its huge. But it was so vast!
And to see it in that perspective was what was very unique for me. <…> It
was impressive and gave me another perspective on something that I see and
think about everyday. (P04)
This
admiration of vastness is also often related to the realization of how small
each individual human is on the scale of the whole world. Here a participant
describes his thoughts when orbiting around Earth: “I was really hoping to
see maybe that sparkle of the civilization, some kind of movement, some kind of
glimmer, to denote my …what's the word …like the size of people, how small
compare to where I am” (P03).
3.2.5.3. Interconnection
Overview
Effect and other transcendent and awe-inspiring experiences have all in common
the cognitive shift leading to a realization of interconnectedness of life. In
our data there were a number of instances that could indicate this realization
of wholeness of the world: “transition from the bottom of the water into the
space scape and that sort of the initial moment when you look at it
holistically and you see …everything is involved in it” (P11). But the most
striking was the observation of the participant when traveling around the
Earth:
There has been so many natural disasters lately with the
hurricanes, fires and all of that. When you see at a global level, the
connection between things that are otherwise separate because of the political
things…When you see as a whole—its just like, well, its just one planet. When
you go around and see that Brazil is so close to Florida, you know politically
things are so far away… (P06)
This
realization of interconnectedness can then lead to behavioral changes, where in
case of the Overview Effect, astronauts feel the need for everyone to unite
together to protect our planet and its inhabitants (White,
2014).
3.2.5.4. Intent of a behavioral change
In our
data there were two comments from one participant that could suggest an intent
for a change in behavior, that could be triggered by the feeling of
interconnectedness. Firstly, on a personal level, she was inspired to learn
more about other people and countries she may not know enough about: “I
don't know much about south America, so it was interesting to look at it when I
can see all other distracting places I know more about. I thought I should
learn more about it” (P06). This could be related to the aspect of
perspective shift related to brining cultures together by developing an
understanding of other cultures [similar to what astronauts describe (Gallagher
et al., 2015)]. Secondly, on a more global level, she had the urge to
communicate this view of interconnectedness to more people:
Just need for people to figure out the environmental sciences,
because its effecting everybody, but these are the artificial lines that seemed
to be so unhelpful. I was thinking from the educators perspective. What a
disservice it is to see a map as flat: things look so much further apart than
they actually are. And that need—if we are going to problem solve bigger
things, how this flat political map is just not going to get us there. (P06)
3.3. Gallagher's
Hermeneutic Analyses of Awe
Gallagher
et al. (2015) undertook syntactical followed by hermeneutic analysis
of astronauts' awe experiences based on 51 texts by 45 astronauts. From the
analysis, Gallagher et al., generated 34 consensus categories of awe. They
allow researchers to determine whether in experimental studies, participants
have experience of awe and Overview Effect. Here (Figure
7), we count the frequency of statements made by our participants that fit
into the awe consensus categories. The categories that were not observed in our
data and not included in the graph are: sublime, poetic expression, peace
(conceptual thought about), inspired, home (feeling of being at home),
fulfillment, floating in void (not related to weightlessness), elation,
disorientation.
FIGURE 7
Figure
7. The number of participants, that had statements coded with
hermeneutics analyses of categories of awe (Gallagher
et al., 2015).
We can
compare the results of this study to the study by Quesnel
and Riecke (2018), that had 16 participants traveling through Google Earth
VR, whose interviews were coded with the same categories of awe based on Gallagher
et al. (2015). Figure
8 shows the comparison of the frequencies of participants coded with
the awe categories between these two studies. The “AWE” experience
was able to elicit more responses of totality, spatial perspective shifts,
sensation of floating and inquisitiveness, while the Google Earth experience
was better at eliciting feelings of sublime and elation. We can speculate that
the sensation of floating and inquisitiveness were elicited as a result of the
narrative arc of the “AWE” experience, that wasn't a part of the
Google Earth experience used in Quesnel
and Riecke (2018). Totality and the spatial perspective shifts observed in
our data are likely related to the “AWE” experience presenting the
Earth from a more distant perspective than Google Earth VR allows. While the
lack of sublime and elation responses in our study could be explained by the
difference of the quality of the Earth models that we had in “AWE” and
in the Google Earth VR.
FIGURE 8
Figure
8. The percentage of participants, that had statements coded with
hermeneutics analyses of categories of awe (Gallagher
et al., 2015) in current study and Quesnel
and Riecke (2018).
Gallagher
et al. (2015) did not report on the number of participants coded with
a certain theme, but rather the total frequencies of codes (within 19
interviews). However, since the lengths and types of interview procedures were
different between the current and Gallagher
et al. (2015) studies, we can not make a precise comparison based on
these counts. Still, in their data the most frequent categories were
perspective shift (moral,internal), contentment, interest/inquisitiveness,
scale effect, and significant sensory experiences, which only partially
intersects with our data, as these categories, even though present, were not as
prominent in our data. The study design was fairly different between our
studies: Gallagher
et al. (2015) study used a spaceflight simulation, designed to be
realistic, that was presented through the screens of cockpit/window as opposed
to an HMD. As their study was a more literal simulation of a spaceflight than “AWE,” it
is possible that their participants were more inclined to think about what they
know about astronauts' experiences, so it is possible that some of these
thoughts were introduced externally based on associations rather than emerged
from the properties of the experience.
4.1. Relating to the
Overview Effect
Stepanova
et al. (2019) analyzed existing records and research on the Overview
Effect and derived design guidelines and evaluation methods for virtual
experiences aiming to elicit the Overview Effect or an extent of it. Comparing
the themes that emerged from our data and the guidelines outlined in Stepanova
et al. (2019), we identify an intersection in the themes outlined in Table
2.
TABLE 2
Table 2.
Selected design and evaluation guidelines for design of the virtual experience
of the Overview Effect from Stepanova
et al. (2019).
From
the evaluation guidelines we were pleased to observe some mini-shifts reported
by participants, that would indicate each one of the 2b-2e themes. Even though
we only observed a few instances of each, it was still very encouraging,
considering that cognitive shifts are not easy to achieve, and it was still an
early prototype of “AWE.” From the design guidelines, the most
strong and interesting intersection was in the privacy, initial fear,
weightlessness and personal connection components.
4.1.1. Privacy and Social Space
Even
though participants were not using the term “private,” from their discussion of
felt safety and comfort we can speculate that “AWE” was able to
achieve the goal set out by the “privacy” design guideline—creating a safe
space for participants to feel comfortable to have a transformative experience.
The social space guideline was aiming to assist with the process of
accommodation that is a necessary component of a transformative experience
following a witnessing of an awe-inspiring vista. Even though only one
participant explicitly discussed it, but he reflected on how going through the
process of the interview was valuable to help him unpack his experience and
understand it on a deeper level than if he was just asked a few questions.
Hence, we believe that the interviews, especially the microphenomenological
method, were able to provide the social space and the conversation that could
facilitate the process of accommodation.
4.1.2. Initial Fear
The
precursors for the Overview Effect are hard to separate from components of a
spaceflight, but the initial moment of fear naturally experienced when being
shot in a rocket into space, is, quite possibly, an important stage in the
progression of the experience (White,
2014). However, few people have personal experiences associated with
rockets, and as such, jumping into water is a more visceral experience for most
and therefore, when part of VR, has a potential to induce stronger response,
which we indeed observed. However, we were surprised by the strength, length
and frequency of fear experiences, as we were only intending for the jump into
the lake to be a moment inducing hesitation and requiring participants to take
the leap of faith. The personal background of participants shaped their
experience of descending through water to be more fearful than we anticipated
during the design process.
4.1.3. Weightlessness
The
connection of feeling of weightlessness and Overview Effect is also unknown as
the records of them are inseparable: it might be essential or not relevant (White,
2014). As the sense of weightlessness on Earth is logistically challenging
to achieve in combination with VR, we were not aiming to replicate it as a part
of the experience. It was insightful to observe that several participants did
have a feeling of floating or weightlessness, and informed us how the narrative
of the experience can facilitate the induction of this sensation.
4.1.4. Personal Connection
In at
least some astronaut's descriptions the feeling of connectedness starts small
from the personal connection to a familiar location, and then extends from
there to the rest of the world. It was interesting to see in our data how
prominent the concept of familiarity was—10/13 participants were discussing it
(with no targeted prompts from interviewers). Two participants also described
how, when orbiting around the Earth, they were picking out familiar locations
to establish connection to them, much like the astronauts describe. The virtual
travel to a familiar place in Google Earth was also powerful at eliciting awe
in the study by Quesnel
and Riecke (2018).
The
other three design guidelines (embodied experience and self-relevancy,
vastness, suspending disbelief through aesthetics) were not as evident in our
data. Even though there are some indications of self-relevancy, for a lot of
participants it was significantly reduced as a result of restricted locomotion
in the last parts of the experience. While perceived vastness was mentioned
three times, this is a fairly low frequency for an experience aiming to elicit
awe (Keltner
and Haidt, 2003). Suspending disbelief through aesthetics was only
partially successful, as a lot of participants were still expecting an accurate
representation of the real world inside the VE and were thrown off by any
observable conflicts. Despite the clearly magical creature, sprite, and the
lake portal into space, some participant's sense of immersion was broken by
seeing jellyfish in fresh water, some trees appearing too tropical for the
local biosphere or the tent seeming too large for one person. Evidently having
magical elements in the narrative wasn't enough for suspending participant's
disbelief, especially when they were very familiar with a specific environment
(e.g., the jellyfish comment was made by participant working at the aquarium).
It might be important to set up the right expectations from before the VR
experience starts by adding a narrative to why participants enter the tent for
going into the VR experience to prepare them for the virtual story.
Overall,
even though the “AWE” experience did not follow all of the
guidelines outlined in Stepanova
et al. (2019), it was able to achieve some indications of each one of the
core components of the overview effect: awe, increased connectedness, increased
responsibility for the environment. The latter being indicated only once by a
participant discussing the need for everyone to unite together to develop a
better understanding of the weather systems as it is effecting everyone.
While awe is a complex emotion, it is hard to make definite
claims as to how much awe did our participants experience: their interviews
indicate a number of components of awe identified by Gallagher
et al. (2015) specifically in the context of the Overview Effect.
However, the physiological measure of piloerection (Benedek
and Kaernbach, 2011) revealed only one instance of awe in this study, which
is either the fault of the recording instrument or, more likely, the result of
the lack of intensity of awe that, even though experienced to some degree,
didn't trigger the physiological reaction.
Connectedness is also a difficult
cognitive construct to objectively measure, that we attempted with IAT. IAT
scores indicated a fairly strong connection between Self and Nature, however
these results are challenging to interpret, as we don't have a baseline for our
Vancouver population. We made the comparison with the data collected with the
same test (with identical items) in California, which could be an approximately
comparable population as they are both from the West Coast of North America,
although there still might be differences. Besides lack of baseline, we also
cannot know how much of the connectedness of nature and self was attributed to
the “AWE,” and how much of it was a personal trait. Implementing
IAT as a pre- and post-test measure could be a possible approach to tackling
this challenge (as in Peck
et al. (2013) in the context of racial bias), but as a reaction time
measure, IAT scores are greatly influenced by learning effects, and therefor
repeated tests become difficult to interpret as a measure of change. IAT is
very rarely implemented as a pre- and post-test measure, and as in Peck
et al. (2013) it requires inviting participants to visit the lab
multiple times, and still expects to observe a strong learning effect. The
qualitative data in our study, however, showed some promising indications of
moments of realization of interconnectedness.
As
traditionally the records of the overview effect are describing a moment during
the spaceflight, it is difficult to separate which components of a spaceflight
experience might be contributing to the Overview Effect and which ones are
unrelated. Until this relationship is clarified, we will have to target both
the components of the spaceflight and the Overview Effect experiences in VR
experience design. In our data we observed some indications of some components
of an experience of a spaceflight: change in perception of space and
weightlessness, but not the change of perception of time and silence. However,
we did not explicitly try to measure them.
4.2. Comparing to Other
VR Awe-Inspiring Experiences
Here,
we want to compare the current VR experience and study with other research
attempting to elicit awe and Overview Effect through the use of VR. This
comparison allows us to speculate about the role that the aspects of the VR
experiences and research tools had on the obtained results, thus informing
future research in this field. Chirico
et al. (2017), Chirico
et al. (2018a), and Chirico
et al. (2018b) have shown that an immersive experience of awe-inducing
stimuli were associated with a self-reported awe measured with a questionnaire,
however these studies used less interactive environment than in our study, and
did not perform an extensive qualitative analyses of how a participant's
experience in VR unfolded, what some key components of it were, and how they
relate to aspects of the virtual environments. Our study is most similar
to Gallagher
et al. (2015) and Quesnel
and Riecke (2018), who also used a VR experience of a spaceflight/orbiting
the Earth and collected qualitative interview data. They reported participants'
experiences of awe in those VEs across 34 consensus categories defined by Gallagher
et al. (2015) hermeneutic analysis, and compared participants' reports
of the virtual experience to real-life accounts from astronauts, with some
similarities identified. However, the environments used in both of these
studies were aiming to provide a realistic representation of the view of the
Earth from outer space, and did not have a strong narrative component unlike “AWE.” Conversely,
with “AWE” we were not aiming to provide a direct, realistic
representation of the astronauts' actual experience, but rather wanted to
integrate specific design features (artistic strategies and narratives) to
create a target emotional journey in a research prototype. Our installation has
elicited less observable goosebumps than Google Earth used in Quesnel
and Riecke (2018), which could be due to a lower-fidelity quality of the
Earth model and usability issues in “AWE.” Another reason might be
that in Quesnel
and Riecke (2018) participants had a choice of their destination in
Google Earth and would often travel to their hometown, which was eliciting
nostalgia, which could have contributed to awe. Another explanations might
include limitations in the wearable goosebump recording instrument, which
changed in prototype design from Quesnel
and Riecke (2018) to the present study; see section 4.4 below.
However, it should be noted that hermeneutic analyses of interviews have produced
comparable distributions of reports related to awe categories between current
and Quesnel
and Riecke (2018) studies, meaning that while goosebump recording may
have failed to detect physical indications of awe, the qualitative analysis has
shown some reliability. The observed differences in distribution of awe
categories can be explained through specifics of the design of the experience,
as discussed above.
Even
though our “AWE” installation in its current state did not elicit
profound transformative experience in participants, it showed promising results
supporting the premise that VR installations can elicit authentic emotional
experiences and induce minor cognitive shifts in some participants. This study
has also revealed some important aspects of an experience participants have
when experiencing this type of immersive installation: specifically the safety
and fear of the environment, familiarity and novelty, affects and bodily
sensations were prominent themes in participants' descriptions.
4.3. Key Outcomes
The
elicited fear and the relief from it were an especially interesting part of the
experience of many participants. Astronauts also describe a similar transition
including the association of the release from fear with the feeling of
weightlessness and silence experiences when floating in space (Stepanova
et al., 2019). This suggests an intriguing opportunity that a narrative in
VR affords: where we could replicate some part of an emotional journey
associated with a spaceflight with a use of a different but more familiar and
visceral metaphor. If we have had recreated in VR an actual spaceflight
experience, that probably wouldn't have achieved the same intensity of an
emotional response as a jump into the lake did. This could also be indicated by
an observation that most participants found the lake or the forest to be the
environments they felt most emotionally connected to. However, when designing a
VR experience seeking a profound emotional reaction, we should be cautious with
inducing fear to avoid prompting a traumatic experience (Madary
and Metzinger, 2016). It's important to learn from the variety of the
experiences that participants had and to design the virtual journey in a way
that facilitates the relief after the minimal fear induction.
To the
best of our knowledge the role of psychological relief on inducing the
feeling/illusion of physical weightlessness hasn't been discussed in the
context of VR experience design. However some VR experiences were able to
induce the feeling of floating or weightlessness. For instance, a meditation
walk through a virtual forest for chronic pain management was able to elicit
the sensation of weightlessness at least in one participant of Tong
et al. (2016). Their study doesn't report on what might have triggered that
sensation, but possibly it was a similar mechanism of relief/release,
but in their case from some of the chronic pain. Jain
et al. (2016) discussed that some of the divers participating in their
virtual scuba-diving simulation felt weightless. However, it's hard to
determine what have triggered it: it might have been that the familiarity of
the environment brought back participants' memories of past diving experiences,
or that the physical set-up of the simulation that was involving a swiveling
torso support and harnesses for the limbs was responsible for the sensation, as
participants were more or less suspended in the air. These type of set-ups
dedicated to specific floating experiences are arguably a little cumbersome and
expensive, as they often include large physical structure, moving platforms or
strapping participants into harnesses, for instance: flying interface such as
Birdly (Rheiner,
2014), skydiving (Eidenberger
and Mossel, 2015) or swimming (Fels
et al., 2005). Even though these interfaces often provide very compelling
experiences, some simpler and cost effective solutions are desirable. Learning
from the reports of our participant's describing the moments when they suddenly
felt weightless could provide new strategies for developing VR experiences inducing
the feeling of floating and weightlessness without the complicated physical
set-ups.
The
number of fear responses observed in the interviews stressed the high
importance of understanding the personal background of participants, and that
each individual's experience would be very different. Experience with
video-games tend to help with objective performance measures in VR simulations,
e.g., in a surgical simulation (Grantcharov
et al., 2003). In our observations, gaming experience has not only
influenced how quickly participants were able to learn the interface and
efficiently navigate through environment, but it also significantly shaped what
expectations participants brought in. We propose (and explore in our ongoing
studies) for affective VR installations to design a pre-VR environment to help
create appropriate expectations of the VR experience being an experiential
piece as opposed to a game that is presenting a challenge that a gamer often
seeks when entering a 3D environment.
Also,
the individual experiences with forest and water environments were key for how
the virtual experience unveiled. Some of participants had diving, cliff-jumping
and camping experiences, while others also reported getting lost in a dark
forest in childhood or being afraid of jumping from heights. All of them formed
a connection between their personal experiences and being in the VE, which
greatly effected their experience. Given everyone's different backgrounds at
the design stage it was difficult to predict the distribution of the reactions
of participants. Similarly, Shin
(2018) in his study showed that personal traits and predispositions of
immersants may have a larger effect on individual's experience of an
empathy-provoking VR (specifically level of embodiment and empathy elicited),
than the specifics of the VR environment and interface. In Quesnel
and Riecke (2018) that used Google Earth VR we also observed that the
innate experiences of each participant were completely different, and that
their personal background and life experience factored into their experience of
positive emotions in the study. However, the trend (that can be generalized
across participants) is that they experienced more awe in VR when they had a
personal connection to the virtual location. Even though some generalizable
trends can be identified, the substantial role of the personal background
presents a challenge for designing profound VR experiences as well as to the
interpretation of results of studies with them, especially quantitative
results. Both designers and researchers need to develop strategies for
addressing this challenge. Including interviews and demographic surveys, as
well as pilot tests with varied demographics should be an integral part of the
development of affective immersive installations in order to be able to
understand participant's experiences, and what was the contribution of the
installation to the affective state achieved by the participant. Studies of
complex experiences and emotions that only collect quantitative data face a
risk of not having the tools to disambiguate the responses they observe that
stem from different participants' backgrounds and mis-attribute it to the
components of the virtual system. This also raises the issue of whether ‘one
size fits all approach’ could be suitable for immersive affective
installations. It will be interesting to explore if procedural content
generation in combination with bio-responsive environments can help create a
more customized journey for each participant building on their personal
background and reactions to the elements of the environment.
4.4. Limitations
There
were likely some biases resulted from being a participant in the study. Even
though participants were provided with limited information about the purpose of
the study, the description given within the consent form could have shaped
their expectations. Another bias stemmed from participants being purposefully
recruited as experts in interactive exhibits and culture spaces, and
consequently they were inclined to provide a lot of feedback on the quality of
the installation. This feedback is exceptionally useful, however the focus on
providing a critic might have distracted some participants from being in a more
experiential state. This is also likely the reason why usability was the most
frequent topic in the interviews, whereas usability concerns were not as
prominent in previous tests of the prototype with a different demographic.
Having to wear the goosebump camera sensors also might have presented a bias in
participant's expectations. Only one participant had explicitly discussed how
she was expecting something to jump out at her to give her goosebumps, but
other participants possibly have also formed some expectations.
4.4.1. Usability Issues and Navigation
Interface
One of
the main limitations of this study in terms of assessing the potential of VR
installation to induce an experience similar to an Overview Effect, is the
usability issues with the “AWE.” Even though most of the participants
generally liked the installation, there are several technical aspects that need
to be improved. Many participants wanted to have more control of their
movement, especially in the underwater and space part of the experience and be
able to move faster. Contrary, a few participants were experiencing motion
sickness from movement through the forest scene, where they had the most
freedom and the fastest movement. Also, some participants wanted to have full
freedom to explore the virtual environment on their own and not to be guided in
any obvious way through the narrative. Some also pointed that qualities of some
virtual models can be improved and larger variety of models can be added to
populate the virtual environment, especially in the underwater scene. The
choice of soundtrack also was questioned by some participants, while
appreciated by others. These, and many other usability related concerns were
limiting the ability of the “AWE” installation to provide environment
for a profound awe-inspiring experience leading to cognitive shifts.
Additionally,
the leaning interface used in this study, even though useful for navigation and
spatial orientation as supported by previous research (Nguyen-Vo,
2018), was found awkward by some participants and likely was not supporting
the sensation of floating. Alternative interfaces, designed for flying (Rheiner,
2014; Eidenberger
and Mossel, 2015) could have supported the feeling of floating, which might
be useful for providing environment in which an experience of an Overview
Effect can occur. In our current iteration of “AWE” we are
integrating the Limbic Chair interface (Patrik
Kunzler, 2019) to hopefully support the feeling of floating. However, all
of these interfaces are fairly complex and expensive, and thus a more
affordable solution of supporting the feeling of floating in VR would be
desirable.
4.4.2. Lack of Goosebumps
A low
number of occurrences of goosebumps in our study is likely associated with a
number of usability issues in the prototype, which would be improved for future
studies, including the resolution of the HMD, the quality of models and
soundscape. However, it is also possible that some goosebumps or shivers did
not register on our camera. There are limitations to our second prototype
goosebump recording device used. In this case, the goosebump recording device
touches nearby skin that is being recorded, and our concern is that goosebumps
that would have otherwise appeared are thus suppressed by the recording device
itself. The first prototype used in Quesnel
and Riecke (2018) was bulkier, but instead touched the underside of
the forearm, leaving the top of the forearm (the recorded surface) out of
contact. This may have allowed for that study's 43% goosebump elicitation rate
in line with previous studies also between 40 and 43% (Benedek
and Kaernbach, 2011; Sumpf
et al., 2015; Wassiliwizky
et al., 2017). Our most recent goosebump instrument prototype now records
the back of the participant's neck.
Interestingly
in this study, the participant that had the moment of shivers, had a slightly
negative connection between Self and Nature. Even though this is only one
instance and no strong inferences can be drawn, this could be an indication
that participants with a lower connection of Self and Nature could be more
likely to have a stronger emotional reaction from observing awe-inspiring view
of the Earth as they would have a stronger need for accommodation than
participants who already feel a strong connection to nature and the experience
easily assimilates into their worldview (Lorini
and Castelfranchi, 2007; Gaggioli,
2016). However, the relationship between the strength of awe and the need
for accommodation was not supported in the study by Schurtz
et al. (2012), where the measure of the need for accommodation did not
predict the measure of awe. However, their study was investigating awe in the
social context, not nature, and their measure of the need of accommodation
wasn't validated, and as such, the results do not eliminate the possibility of
the relationship between the degree of the need of accommodation and the
intensity of awe.
4.4.3. Gender Effects
Noteworthy,
some gender differences were apparent in the descriptions of evoked emotions in
the experience, that were less readily discussed by male participants than
female, which is aligned with the research on gender differences in use of
affective language (Goldshmidt
and Weller, 2000). Micro-phenomenological interviews might be useful for
guiding male participants to bring their attention to the affective dimension
and assist them with verbalizing their feelings.
4.5. Comparing the
Interview Methods
The two
interview techniques—cued-recall debrief and micro-phenomenology—were
successful in helping participants provide a detailed account of their
experience, with more thorough and deep description than a semi-structured
interview or a survey could have achieved. This is evident from comparing the richness
and precision of the descriptions collected in this study with our earlier
pilot tests, that used semi-structured interviewers. Unsurprisingly, the
cued-recall method was a little better at encouraging the feedback about the
system/installation and the micro-phenomenology the feedback about the
progression and dimensions of individual experience. However, both methods have
limitations: the micro-phenomenological interviews are zooming in only on a few
moments, and thus don't address experience as a whole and provide little light
on the portions of the experience that were not chosen, while cued-recall
debrief doesn't provide as much depth in descriptions and is less rigorously
structured, meaning that there might be more bias introduced by interviewer. We
can also observe some trends in what type of responses are more likely to be
provided within a given interview: for instance, from Figure
7 we can see that body change responses are more likely to be reported
in a micro-phenomenological interview, while intellectual appreciation in a
cued-recall interview. This is anticipated given the interview structure.
This
study indicated that a virtual experience, inspired by the Overview Effect and
designed to elicit awe, despite some usability concerns, was able to invite
minor transformative experiences in some participants, including the main
aspects of it: the appreciation of beauty and vastness (Keltner
and Haidt, 2003), realization of interconnectedness (Yaden
et al., 2016) and a potential intent to change one's behavior based on that
realization (White,
2014; Stepanova
et al., 2018). We have also discovered some unique opportunities VR
technology affords for a design of a profound experience: the opportunity to
create a journey taking the participant through induction of a minimal fear in
a safe environment and a following release from it; and the opportunity to
explore the mind-body connection and the effects of shifting the strength and
the locus of control within it.
The
qualitative data of participants' experiences in this study inspires some
research hypotheses that can be tested with experimental studies. A few of the
hypotheses generated as a result of this study are:
1. Designing for a transition between environments eliciting
feelings of safety and fear can induce shifts in those states and these shifts,
can be associated with bodily sensations and perceived separation of mind and
body.
2. Familiarity and Novelty of the virtual environment are
important parameters that effect the affective experience of the virtual world.
Designing familiar environments would elicit experiences of safety, comfort and
trust, while novel environments will elicit curiosity and excitement.
3. Creating or providing familiar objects or characters in VR,
helps immersants cope with uncomfortable experiences.
4. A familiar visceral experience simulated in VR, such as a
jump into water will induce stronger emotional reaction than more dangerous, but
unfamiliar experience such as a simulation of flying in a rocket.
5.
Seeing rotating Earth and day and night happening on Earth at the same time
from first person perspective gives a novel perspective and understanding of
the world.
Giving
the reliance of this line of research on deep emotional responses and
importance of individual background, we see two important directions for future
development of this project: first, extensive demographics information and
interviews are required when using quantitative methods of assessment in order
to be able to explain results in the context of a personal experience; second,
more flexible, bio-responsive and personalizable experience, that can adapt to
the immersant's state is desirable and will be able to create a smoother
journey to the desired emotional response.
In the
future work we are planning to integrate more physiological sensors (Quesnel
et al., 2018a) and automatizing the goosebump detection (Uchida
et al., 2018), combined with interviews of the events identified from the
physiological data. This will allow us to develop deeper understanding of
progression of one's experience in an immersive affective installations, and
identify what elements of the journey might be triggering the specific
responses in the participants.
VR
experiences, inspired by natural phenomena, provide us with an exciting
opportunity to study an individual's experience in detail and establish the
relation between the experience and the environment. However, we argue that a
profound experiences mediated through technology should be seen as its own
category of phenomena that requires more exploration. To build this body of
knowledge more studies need to explore how profound affective VR personal
experiences unfold. This knowledge would inform future design of positive
transformative VR experiences that would make such desirable experiences more
accessible to the public.
The
ethics approval was granted by Simon Fraser University Office of Research
Ethics (Study#: 2017s0269). Consent form was signed digitally by each
participant upon arrival to the study space.
ES, DQ,
and BR contributed conception of the project and design of the virtual
experience and the study. ES coordinated the study. ES and DQ lead the data
collection process. ES transcribed most of the interviews with the help of
other members of the research group. ES and DQ developed the coding scheme and
analyzed the interview data. ES was responsible for the thematic analyses,
while DQ for the awe consensus categories analyses. ES implemented and analyzed
IAT test. DQ designed goosebump camera instrument. DQ and ES coded the
goosecamera recordings. ES wrote the majority of the manuscript. DQ contributed
several sections, specifically related to hermeneutics analyses and goosebump
camera. All authors revised and contributed to manuscript. BR supervised the
whole project. This work appears in ES's thesis (Stepanova,
2018).
The
funding for this project was provided through NSERC R619563 and 31-611547 and
Small Institutional SSHRC Grant R632273, Simon Fraser University (SFU), and
Centre for Digital Media (CDM).
The
authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial
or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of
interest.
We are
thanking the Centre for Digital Media, Patrick Pennefather and the Drifting
Pugs team for their tremendous help with the development of the virtual
experience as well as the NGX Interactive for their valuable support and
providing the space for the study. We are also thanking the members of the
iSpace Lab (Ivan Aguilar and Alexandra Kitson) and Elgin-Skye Mclaren for their
assistance with running the study and Mirjana Prpa for conducting the
micro-phenomenological interviews.
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