{"title":"Repeated exposure to virtual reality decreases reliance on visual inputs for balance control in healthy adults","authors":"Christophe Barbanchon, Dominique Mouraux, Stéphane Baudry","doi":"10.1016/j.humov.2024.103236","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Postural control may encounter acute challenges when individuals are immersed in a virtual reality (VR) environment, making VR a potential pertinent tool for enhancing balance capacity. Nonetheless, the effects of repeated exposure to VR on balance control remain to be fully elucidated. Fifty-five healthy participants stood upright for six bouts of 90 s each in an immersive virtual reality (VR) environment using a head-mounted display (repeated VR exposure). During these bouts, participants experienced simulated forward and backward displacements. Before and after the repeated VR exposure, the center of pressure mean velocity (VEL<sub>COP</sub>) was measured in response to simulated forward and backward displacement in VR, as well as during quiet upright standing with eyes open (EO) and closed (EC) in the real environment. The results revealed a significant decrease in VEL<sub>COP</sub> for forward and backward simulated displacements in both antero-posterior and medio-lateral directions (<em>p</em> < 0.01) after compared to before repeated VR exposure. Furthermore, VEL<sub>COP</sub> significantly decreased when participants stood upright in EC (−5%; <em>p</em> = 0.004), but not EO (+3%; <em>p</em> > 0.05) in the real environment after repeated VR exposure. The Romberg ratio (EC/EO) was reduced in both antero-posterior and medio-lateral directions (<em>p</em> < 0.05) after VR exposure. This study indicates that repeated exposure to VR induces changes in balance control in both virtual and real environments. These changes may be attributed, in part, to a reduction in the weighting of visual inputs in the multisensory integration process occurring during upright standing. Accordingly, these findings highlight VR as a potentially effective tool for balance rehabilitation.</p></div><div><h3>Significance statement</h3><p>This study indicates that repeated exposure to VR induces changes in balance control in both virtual and real environments that can rely, in part, on a reduction in the weighting of visual inputs in the multisensory integration process occurring during upright standing.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":55046,"journal":{"name":"Human Movement Science","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.6000,"publicationDate":"2024-05-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Human Movement Science","FirstCategoryId":"102","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167945724000599","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"NEUROSCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Postural control may encounter acute challenges when individuals are immersed in a virtual reality (VR) environment, making VR a potential pertinent tool for enhancing balance capacity. Nonetheless, the effects of repeated exposure to VR on balance control remain to be fully elucidated. Fifty-five healthy participants stood upright for six bouts of 90 s each in an immersive virtual reality (VR) environment using a head-mounted display (repeated VR exposure). During these bouts, participants experienced simulated forward and backward displacements. Before and after the repeated VR exposure, the center of pressure mean velocity (VELCOP) was measured in response to simulated forward and backward displacement in VR, as well as during quiet upright standing with eyes open (EO) and closed (EC) in the real environment. The results revealed a significant decrease in VELCOP for forward and backward simulated displacements in both antero-posterior and medio-lateral directions (p < 0.01) after compared to before repeated VR exposure. Furthermore, VELCOP significantly decreased when participants stood upright in EC (−5%; p = 0.004), but not EO (+3%; p > 0.05) in the real environment after repeated VR exposure. The Romberg ratio (EC/EO) was reduced in both antero-posterior and medio-lateral directions (p < 0.05) after VR exposure. This study indicates that repeated exposure to VR induces changes in balance control in both virtual and real environments. These changes may be attributed, in part, to a reduction in the weighting of visual inputs in the multisensory integration process occurring during upright standing. Accordingly, these findings highlight VR as a potentially effective tool for balance rehabilitation.
Significance statement
This study indicates that repeated exposure to VR induces changes in balance control in both virtual and real environments that can rely, in part, on a reduction in the weighting of visual inputs in the multisensory integration process occurring during upright standing.
期刊介绍:
Human Movement Science provides a medium for publishing disciplinary and multidisciplinary studies on human movement. It brings together psychological, biomechanical and neurophysiological research on the control, organization and learning of human movement, including the perceptual support of movement. The overarching goal of the journal is to publish articles that help advance theoretical understanding of the control and organization of human movement, as well as changes therein as a function of development, learning and rehabilitation. The nature of the research reported may vary from fundamental theoretical or empirical studies to more applied studies in the fields of, for example, sport, dance and rehabilitation with the proviso that all studies have a distinct theoretical bearing. Also, reviews and meta-studies advancing the understanding of human movement are welcome.
These aims and scope imply that purely descriptive studies are not acceptable, while methodological articles are only acceptable if the methodology in question opens up new vistas in understanding the control and organization of human movement. The same holds for articles on exercise physiology, which in general are not supported, unless they speak to the control and organization of human movement. In general, it is required that the theoretical message of articles published in Human Movement Science is, to a certain extent, innovative and not dismissible as just "more of the same."