Vestibular Feedback on a Virtual Reality Wheelchair Driving Simulator: a Pilot Study

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Autonomy and ability to maintain social activities can be challenging for people with disabilities experiencing reduced mobility. In the case of disabilities impacting mobility, Power Wheelchairs can help such people keeping or regain autonomy. Nonetheless, driving a power wheelchair is a complex task that requires a combination of cognitive, visual and visuo-spatial abilities. In practice, people need to pass prior ability tests and driving training before being prescribed a power wheelchair by their therapist. Still, conventional training in occupational therapy can be insufficient for some people with severe cognitive and/or visuo-spatial functions. As such, these people are often prevented to obtain a power wheelchair prescription from their therapist for safety concerns. In this context, driving simulators might be efficient and promising tools to provide alternative, adaptive, flexible, and safe training. In previous work, we proposed a Virtual Reality (VR) driving simulator integrating a vestibular feedback to simulate wheelchair motion sensations. The performance and acceptability of a VR simulator rely on satisfying user Quality of Experience (QoE). Therefore, our simulator is designed to provide high Sense of Presence (SoP) and low Cybersickness to the user. This paper presents a pilot study assessing the impact of the provided vestibular feedback on user Quality of Experience (QoE). Participants were asked to perform a driving task while being in the simulator within 2 conditions: with vestibular feedback and without vestibular feedback. User QoE is assessed through subjective questionnaires measuring user SoP and cybersickness. Results show that vestibular feedback activation increases SoP and decreases cybersickness. This study constitutes a mandatory step before clinical trials and, as such, only enrolled people without disabilities