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PrefaceThis work was performed in support the "Development and Assessment of ADL Prototypes" task sponsored by the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, Readiness and Training Directorate under the general direction of Dr. Robert Wisher (OUSD/P&R). It partially fulfills the objectives of this task to use Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) prototypes and other appropriate sources to develop an "engineering of instruction" that links specific instructional design alternatives to specific instructional outcomes and to assist in the cost and effectiveness assessment of ADL prototypes, including assistance in the design of assessment experiments, collection of assessment data, and documentation of findings.Many researchers reviewed or added details to the information presented on their experimental studies. We are grateful for all such contributions. We also gratefully acknowledge those individuals who reviewed and provided comments on this document. Executive SummaryWhile reviewing research on how to maximize the effectiveness of the use of virtual environments (VEs) for Department of Defense (DoD) applications, data were collected based on the role that the sense of presence plays in VE applications. The potential importance of presence is based on a common assumption that increasing the sense of presence experienced in a VE leads to improved task performance.This document is intended as a resource document that presents the results of this data collection effort. It considers (place) presence, co-presence, and social presence. Nearly 70 different measures and over 100 experimental studies of various issues regarding presence are identified.Few of the experimental studies have attempted to examine the potential relationship between presence and task performance. This small set of studies has used four different measures of presence and nine different types of performance measures. Out of 83 findings, 42 showed a significant correlation between presence and task performance, most in the expected direction. As yet, there is no evidence on whether the relationships that do exist are causal in nature.Nonetheless, some conclusions are clear. Despite a decade of research, the role of presence in VEs is still unclear. There is no commonly agreed theory of presence nor are there common measures for this construct. There is some evidence that particular technological, tasks and personal characteristics can influence the extent of presence experienced in a VE. However, the critical question of whether manipulating presence can achieve improved task performance remains unanswered.1

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