Motion sickness and sense of presence in three virtual reality environments developed for manual wheelchair users

Visually Induced Motion Sickness (VIMS) is a bothersome and sometimes unsafe experience, frequently experienced in Virtual Reality (VR) environments. In this study, the effect of up-to-four training sessions to decrease VIMS in the VR environment to a minimal level was tested and verified through explicit declaration of all 14 healthy participants. Additionally, total, gastrointestinal, and central motion sickness were shown to decrease significantly by the last training session, compared to the first one, based on participants’ responses to Motion Sickness Assessment Questionnaire (MSAQ). Then, during each of the two main sessions, participants performed few trials of the Illinois agility test in three VR systems and in real world, then completed MSAQ and Igroup Presence Questionnaire (IPQ). The VR systems received relatively low MSAQ and high IPQ scores, with no statistically meaningful difference among either of them. Also, it was shown that presence has a significant negative correlation with VIMS.