Positive Technology Journal

Via VRoot

Presence: a unique characteristic in educational virtual environments

Virtual Reality Journal, Volume 10, Number 3-4 / December, 2006, Pages 197-206.

Author: Tassos A. Mikropoulos

This article investigates the effect of presence on learning outcomes in educational virtual environments (EVEs) in a sample of 60 pupils aged between 11 and 13 years. We study the effect of personal presence, social presence and participant’s involvement on certain learning outcomes. We also investigate if the combination of the participant’s representation model in the virtual environment (VE) with the way it is presented gives a higher sense of presence that contributes to learning outcomes. Our results show that the existence of an avatar as the pupils’ representation enhanced presence and helped them to successfully perform their learning tasks. The pupils had a high sense of presence for both cases of the EVE presentation, projection on a wall and through a head mounted display (HMD). Our socialized virtual environment seems to play an important role in learning outcomes. The pupils had a higher sense of presence and completed their learning tasks more easily and successfully in the case of their egocentric representation model using the HMD.

Via 3D Point

SL resident Turner Boehm has developed an application that allows to automatically model the links and nodes of a complex system using SL objects. The picture above shows multiple interconnecting software systems represented by an automatically generated set of prims, based on information stored outside SL.

From 3D point

Multiverse, is a free virtual-world development platform, which has just gone from closed to open beta.

From the Multiverse website:

Virtual reality, telemedicine, web and data processing innovations in medical and psychiatric education and clinical care.

Acad Psychiatry. 2006;30(6):528-33

Authors: Hilty DM, Alverson DC, Alpert JE, Tong L, Sagduyu K, Boland RJ, Mostaghimi A, Leamon ML, Fidler D, Yellowlees PM

OBJECTIVE: This article highlights technology innovations in psychiatric and medical education, including applications from other fields. METHOD: The authors review the literature and poll educators and informatics faculty for novel programs relevant to psychiatric education. RESULTS: The introduction of new technologies requires skill at implementation and evaluation to assess the pros and cons. There is a significant body of literature regarding virtual reality and simulation, including assessment of outcomes, but other innovations are not well studied. CONCLUSIONS: Innovations, like other uses of technology, require collaboration between parties and integration within the educational framework of an institution.

Education about hallucinations using an internet virtual reality system: a qualitative survey.

Acad Psychiatry. 2006;30(6):534-9

Authors: Yellowlees PM, Cook JN

OBJECTIVE: The authors evaluate an Internet virtual reality technology as an education tool about the hallucinations of psychosis. METHOD: This is a pilot project using Second Life, an Internet-based virtual reality system, in which a virtual reality environment was constructed to simulate the auditory and visual hallucinations of two patients with schizophrenia. Eight hundred sixty-three self-referred users took a self-guided tour. RESULTS: Five hundred seventy-nine (69%) of the users who toured the environment completed a survey. Of the survey responders, 440 (76%) thought the environment improved their understanding of auditory hallucinations, 69% thought it improved their understanding of visual hallucinations, and 82% said they would recommend the environment to a friend. CONCLUSIONS: Computer simulations of the perceptual phenomena of psychiatric illness are feasible with existing personal computer technology. Integration of the evaluation survey into the environment itself was possible. The use of Internet-connected graphics environments holds promise for public education about mental illness.

Via 3D Point 

A browser called 3B that allows you take existing 2D Web content and make an avatarized 3D space out of it that others can visit. From the site:

“3B allows you take any web sites or photos and place them in a personalized 3D space, your 3B village. You can use MySpace, Hi5 or Bebo pages or photos you’ve loaded onto Flickr, Photobucket or any other web service.”

From the project's website (via 3D point):

The Ogoglio project is exploring shared online worlds in the context of web enabled work. If World of Warcraft is "the new golf", then we're exploring "the new business district".

We are creating spaces where people will meet with remote coworkers, collaborate using new tools, integrate existing business applications, and enjoy the benefits of being in the same office with people in different time zones.

Project summary:

Many people now start their careers with a deep understanding of cooperative 3D communities like World of Warcraft, but when they enter the workplace they are handed email and a shared calendar and are expected to teach themselves how to be productive. Instead of forcing people to limit their communication to these thin channels, The Ogoglio project will provide community workspaces with the planning and coordination tools which have proven to be effective in multiplayer online games.

Link to the Ogoglio blog

From Smart Mobs

Rhythms of social interaction: messaging within a massive online network (PDF) by Scott Golder, Dennis Wilkinson, and Bernardo Huberman:

"We have analyzed the fully-anonymized headers of 362 million messages exchanged by 4.2 million users of Facebook, an online social network of college students, during a 26 month interval. The data reveal a number of strong daily and weekly regularities which provide insights into the time use of college students and their social lives, including seasonal variations. We also examined how factors such as school affiliation and informal online “friend” lists affect the observed behavior and temporal patterns. Finally, we show that Facebook users appear to be clustered by school with respect to their temporal messaging patterns.

Re-blogged from TechCrunch 

Instant messaging programs connect people across the Internet. Newer programs like RadiusIM and Meetro, connect people by their real-world location. RadiusIM is an AJAX application, while Meetro is a downloadable client. Both allow you to fill out your location and profile as a way to meet new people in your area, or even another country. Unlike the other developments in chat, location based IM hasn’t seen heavy adoption on other platforms, which continue to connect people based on a user generated buddy list.

National LambdaRail (NLR) announced today that it is developing a plan to implement a Telepresence testbed based on the Cisco Telepresence Meeting solution by mid-2007. With its nationwide optical backbone connected to nearly 20 regional optical networks, it will be simple for researchers to participate in the testbed from key research and education facilities throughout the nation. A call for participation will be issued early next year.

Read the full news release

Controlling posture using a plantar pressure-based, tongue-placed tactile biofeedback system.

Exp Brain Res. 2006 Nov 30;

Authors: Vuillerme N, Chenu O, Demongeot J, Payan Y

The present paper introduces an original biofeedback system for improving human balance control, whose underlying principle consists in providing additional sensory information related to foot sole pressure distribution to the user through a tongue-placed tactile output device. To assess the effect of this biofeedback system on postural control during quiet standing, ten young healthy adults were asked to stand as immobile as possible with their eyes closed in two conditions of No-biofeedback and Biofeedback. Centre of foot pressure (CoP) displacements were recorded using a force platform. Results showed reduced CoP displacements in the Biofeedback relative to the No-biofeedback condition. The present findings evidenced the ability of the central nervous system to efficiently integrate an artificial plantar-based, tongue-placed tactile biofeedback for controlling control posture during quiet standing.