Methods for Correlating Visual Scene Elements with Simulator Sickness Incidence

Abstract

Simulator sickness occurs in a large number of Army, Navy, and Marine Corps simulators, and is most prevalent in moving-base, rotary-wing devices which employ cathode ray tube (CRT) video displays as opposed to fixed-wing, dome-display trainers with no motion base. Based on data from a factor analysis of over 1000 Navy and Marine Corps pilot simulation exposures, a new scoring procedure was applied to two helicopter simulators with similar rates of simulator sickness incidence. Based on the factor analytic scoring key, the two simulators showed slightly different sickness profiles. Preliminary work was begun to record the visual scene by video frame-by-frame decomposition and automated scoring algorithms were developed. The findings are discussed from the standpoints of (1) recommendations for future design and use of simulators, and (2) the metric advantages and other merits of the “field experiment” methodology to address human factors problems with simulator sickness.

Effects of Navigation Speed on Motion Sickness Caused by an Immersive Virtual Environment

“…The spatial frequency inside an optokinetic drum can easily be calculated because of its regular pattern, but it is more difficult to measure the average spatial frequencies of a VE. Kennedy, Berbaum, and Smith (1993), Kennedy, Drexler, and Berbaum (1994), and Kennedy, Berbaum, Dunlap, and Hettinger (1996) developed the first automated method to quantify the visual stimulus for the study of cybersickness. The reported method was referred to as the "human judged kinematics cluster score" (Kennedy, Berbaum, et al, 1996).…”

Relations among Comfort of Fabrics, Ratings of Comfort, and Visual Vigilance

“…There are several available approaches to measuring cognitive performance (Dinges, 1992;Kennedy, Berbaum, & Smith, 1993;Kennedy, Dunlap, Turnage, & Wdkes, 1993), most of which have been incorporated into several different computer software packages. The program chosen for this study was E-Prime (Psychology Software Tools, Beta Version 1.0, November 19991, ~rimarily because this software program allows customizing the test design.…”

Smart Driver Training Simulation

“…An investigation in flight simulators showed that simulator sickness occurs far more rarely when the visual display is improved, without the motion simulation being changed (Kennedy et al, 1993). not caused by technology.…”