Virtual Humans

Creating realistic animations of virtual humans remains comparatively complex and expensive. This research explores the degree to which animation fidelity affects users' gaze behavior when interacting in virtual reality training simulations that include virtual humans. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions, wherein the virtual patient either: 1) was not animated; 2) played …

In a group setting, it is possible for attributes of one group member to indirectly affect how other group members are perceived. In this paper, we explore whether one group member’s agency (e.g. if they are real or virtual) can indirectly affect behavior with other group members. We also consider whether variations in the agency of a group member directly affects behavior with that group …

Despite research showing that team training can lead to strong improvements in team performance, logistical difficulties can prevent team training programs from being adopted on a large scale. A proposed solution to these difficulties is the use of virtual humans to replace missing teammates. Existing research evaluating the use of virtual humans for team training has been conducted in settings …

Breakdowns in team communication are a common source of error. Unfortunately, even when errors are identified, team members may not speak up about the error, often out of fear of confrontation. We propose that virtual humans may be used to help prepare people to speak up. To this end, we conducted a between-subjects study examining speaking up behavior with real and virtual humans. Forty-eight …

In this paper we present a study exploring whether the physical presence of another human changes how people perceive and behave with virtual teammates. We conducted a study (n = 69) in which nurses worked with a simulated health care team to prepare a patient for surgery. The agency of participants' teammates was varied between conditions; participants either worked with a virtual surgeon and a …

Due to logistical scheduling challenges, social training of conflict resolution skills with healthcare professionals is a difficult task. To overcome these challenges, we used virtual humans to fill in as surgical teammates and train conflict resolution skills in a surgical scenario. Surgical technologists were recruited at a United States teaching hospital to interact with a virtual nurse, …

This research explores the extent to which humans behave realistically during conflict with a virtual human occupying a position of authority. To this end, we created a virtual team to train nurses how to manage conflict in the operating room; the team’s virtual surgeon engages in reckless behavior that could endanger the safety of the team’s patient, requiring nurses to intervene and correct the …

In this paper, we present the preliminary results of an ongoing study exploring how mixed-agency teams influence feelings of social presence. Participants worked with a team composed of either two virtual humans or a team composed of one virtual human and one real human. We found that while the presence of a human teammate did not affect overall feelings of social presence, the presence of a human …

Mixed reality and 3D user interface technologies have increased the immersion, presence, and physicality of user interactions. These technologies can also increase the physicality of embodied conversational agents (ECAs) by making the ECAs occupy and interact with the physical space. We propose that increasing the physicality of an ECA can increase the ECA’s social presence, that is, the …